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'J 



EREWHON REVISITED 



BY THE SAME AUTHOR 

EREWHON 

OR OVER THE RANGE 

"It is not wonderful that such a man as 
Butler should be the author of 'Erewhon,' 
a shrewd and biting satire on modern life 
and thought — the best of its kind since 
'Gulliver's Travels.' ... To lash the 
age, to ridicule vain pretensions, to expose 
hypocrisy, to deride humbug in education, 
politics, and religion, are tasks beyond 
most men's powers; but occasionally, 
very occasionally, a bit of genuine satire 
secures for itself more than a passing nod 
of recognition. 'Erewhon,' I think, is 
such a satire." 

— Augustine Birrell, in The Speaker 
E. P. BUTTON & COMPANY 




y:^..^^^ 



Samuel Butler at Twenty-Three Years of Age 
(From a Photograph taken in 1858) 



Erewhon Revisited 

TWENTY YEARS LATER 

BOTH BY THE ORIGINAL DISCOVERER OF 
THE COUNTRY AND BY HIS SON 

BY 

SAMUEL BUTLER 

AUTHOR OF "erewhon," "THE WAY OF ALL FLESH," 

"life and habit," etc., etc. 

WITH AN INTRODUCTION BY 
MOREBY ACKLOM 




NEW YORK 

E. P. DUTTON & COMPANY 

68i FIFTH AVENUE 



Copyright, 1920, 
By E. p. DUTTON & COMPANY 



All Rights Reserved 






ORIGINAL EDITION, igoi 



The Portrait of Samuel Butler, which forms the Frontispiece 
of this volume, is reproduced from Mr. Henry Festing Jones* 
"Samuel Butler, Author of Erewhoa," by special permission 
of The Macmillan Company, New .York, Publishers. 



Printed In the United States of America, 



m Id 1920 
©11A571052 



AUTHOR'S PREFACE 

TO THE ORIGINAL EDITION 

I FORGET when, hut not very long after I had published 
"Erewhon" in 1872, it occurred to me to ask myself 
what course events in Erewhon would probably take 
after Mr. Higgs, as I suppose I may now call him, had 
made his escape in the balloon with Arowhena. Given 
a people in the conditions supposed to exist in Erewhon, 
and given the apparently miraculous ascent of a re- 
markable stranger into the heavens with an earthly 
bride — what would be the effect on the people gen- 
erally f 

There was no use in trying to solve this problem 
before, say, twenty years should have given time for 
Erezvhonian developments to assume something like 
permanent shape, and in 1892 / was too busy with 
books now published to be able to attend to Erewhon. 
It was not till the early winter of 1900, i.e., as nearly 
as may be thirty years after the date of Higgs's 
escape, that I found time to deal with the question 
above stated, and to anszvcr it, according to my lights, 
in the book zvliich I nozv lay before the public. 

I have concluded, I believe rightly, that the events 
described in Chapter XXIV. of ''Erewhon'' woidd give 
rise to such a cataclysmic change in the old Erezvhonian 
opinions as zvould result in the development of a new 
religion. Now the development of all new religions 
follows much the same general course. In all cases the 



vi Author's Preface 

times are more or less out of joint — older fcdths are 
losing their hold upon the masses. At such times, let a 
personality appear, strong in itself, and made to seem 
still stronger by association with some supposed tran- 
scendent miracle, and it will he easy to raise a Lo here! 
that will attract many followers. If there be a single 
great, and apparently well-authenticated, miracle, 
others will accrete round it; then, in all religions that 
have so originated, there will follow temples, priests, 
rites, sincere believers, and unscrupidous exploiters of 
public credidity. To chronicle the events that followed 
Higgs's balloon ascent without shewing that they were 
much as they have been under like conditions in other 
places, would be to hold the mirror up to something 
very wide of nature. 

Analogy, however, between courses of events is one 
thing — historic parallelisms abound; analogy between 
the mam actors in events is a very different one, and 
one, moreover, of which few examples can be found. 
The development of the new ideas in Erewhon is ai 
familiar one, but there is no more likeness between 
Higgs and the founder of any other religion, than there 
is between Jesus Christ and Mahomet. He is a typical 
middle-class Englishman, deeply tainted with priggish- 
ness in his earlier years, but in great part freed from 
it by the sweet uses of adversity. 

If I may be allowed for a moment to speak about 
myself, I would say that I have never ceased to profess 
myself a member of the more advanced wing of the 
English Broad Church. What those who belong to this 
wing believe, I believe. What they reject, I reject. No 
two people think absolutely alike on any subject, hut 
when I converse with advanced Broad Churchmen I 



Author's Preface vii 

find myself in substantial harmony with them. I be- 
lieve — and should he very sorry if I did not believe — 
that, mutatis mutandis, such men mill find the advice 
given on pp. 250-253 and 259-263 of this book much 
what, under the supposed circumstances, they would 
themselves give. 

Lastly, I should express my great obligations to Mr. 
R. A. Streatfeild of the British Museum, who, in the 
absence from England of my friend Mr. H. Festing 
Jones, has kindly supervised the corrections of my book 
as it passed through the press. 

SAMUEL BUTLER. 
May I, 1901 



CONTENTS 

PACK 

Introduction by Morehy Acklom .... xiii 

CHAPTER 

I. Ups and downs of Fortune — My father starts for 

Erewhon i 

II. To the foot of the pass into Erewhon .... i6 

III. My father while camping is accosted by Professors 

Hanky and Panky 22 

IV. My father overhears more of Hanky and Panky's 

conversation 35 

V. My father meets a son, of whose existence he was 

ignorant, and strikes a bargain with him . . 49 

VI. Further conversation between father and son — The 

Professor^s hoard 61 

VII. Signs of the new order of things catch my father^ s 

eye on every side 69 

VIII. Yram, now Mayoress, gives a dinner-party, in the 
course of which she is disquieted by what she 
learns from Professor Hanky: she sends for her 

son George and questions him 79 

IX. Interview between Yram and her son .... 92 

X. My father, fearing recognition at Sunch'ston, be- 
takes himself to the neighbouring town of Fair- 
mead 102 

XL President Gurgoyle's pamphlet ^'On the Physics 

of Vicarious Existence^' 113 

ix 



X Contents 

CHAPTER 

XII. George fails to find my father, whereon Yram 

cautions the Professors 125 

XIII. A visit to the Provincial Deformatory at Fair- 

mead 136 

XIV. My father makes the acquaintance of Mr. Balmy, 

and walks with him next day to Sunch^ston . 146 

XV. The temple is dedicated to my father, and certain 

extracts are read from his supposed sayings . 161 

XVI. Professor Hanky preaches a sermon, in the course 
of which my father declares himself to he the 
Sunchild I7S 

XVII. George takes his father to prison, and there obtains 

some useful information 190 

XVIII. Yram invites Dr. Downie and Mrs. Humdrum to 
luncheon — A passage at arms between her and 
Hanky is amicably arranged 199 

XIX. A council is held at the Mayor^s, in the course of 

which George turns the tables on the Professors . 204 

XX. Mrs. Humdrum and Dr. Downie propose a com- 
promise, which, after an amendment by George, 
is carried nem. con 214 

XXI. Yram, on getting rid of her guests, goes to the 

prison to see my father 221 

XXII . Mainly occupied with a veracious extract from a 

SuncKstonian journal 230 

XXIII. My father is escorted to the Mayor^s house, 
and is introduced to a future daughter-in- 
law 241 



Contents xi 

CHAPTER PAGB 

XXIV. After dinner^ Dr. Downie and the Professors 
would be glad to know what is to be done about 
Sunchildism 248 

XXV. George escorts my father to the statues; the two then 

part 257 

XXVI. My father reaches home, and dies not long after- 
wards 267 

XXVII. / meet my brother George at the statues, on the top 

of the pass into Erewhon 274 

XXVIII. George and I spend a few hours together at the 
statues, and then part — / reach home — Post- 
script 288 



INTRODUCTION 

For all admirers of Samuel Butler special interest 
attaches to Erewhon Revisited. It is the last book that 
he wrote, though not the latest published. Not only 
this, but being a sequel to one of his own books written 
some thirty years before, and being concerned with 
substantially the same locality and the same people, it 
affords us a parallax, as it were, by means of which we 
may appraise the evolution of Butlers mind and style 
during the mature years of his life and thought. 

There are great differences between Erewhon and 
Erewhon Revisited. The former is very little of a 
story and very much of a satirical comment on the cus- 
toms and ideals of late-Victorian England. In fact, 
with the exception of the description of Higgs' dis- 
covery of the lost country Erewhon, and of his escape 
from it about a year later in an amateur balloon with 
his stolen Erewhonian bride, there is practically no 
action and no story. In Erewhon Revisited, on the 
other hand, we have an exceedingly clever and interest- 
ing story with a good deal of ingenious action which 
suggests that if Butler had not been so exclusively con- 
cerned with matters of larger importance, he might 
have written good detective yarns. Erewhon Revis- 
ited is also a satire, but in this case the satire is nar- 
rowed down to two principal matters instead of em- 
bracing the whole of modern social conduct. The 

xiii 



xiv Introduction 

objects of attack are the professorial class and the 
dogmas of tlie Christian Church. 

Butler's antipathy for college professors as a class is 
heartily reciprocated by the professors. Witness Pro- 
fessor Lyon Phelps' characterization of The Way of 
All Flesh as a ''diabolical novel," and Professor 
Stewart P. Sherman's recent vitriolic attack on But- 
ler's whole life and character in the columns of The 
Evening Post. Yet it is rather amusing to contem- 
plate that Butler himself stood for the Slade Profes- 
sorship of Fine Arts in Cambridge University in 1886, 
and apparently almost succeeded in capturing the 
appointment. It is an interesting speculation to pic- 
ture what would have been the mutual reaction of 
Butler as a professor on Cambridge, and of a Cam- 
bridge professorship on Butler. Hiere is no doubt» 
however, that Butler's views on professors had evolved 
considerably in the thirty years which lay between 
Ere7ifhon and Erc^ifhon Reinsitetf. In Erewhon, 
though he certainly says that they 

seemed to devote themselves to the avoidance of 
every opinion with which they were not perfectly 
familiar and regarded their own brains as a sort 
of sanctuary t(^ which if an opinion had once re- 
sorted, none other was to attack it. 

Erewhon (Chapter xxii). 

he does speak of them as kindly, hospitable gentlemen, 
whereas in Erczvhon Rcinsited he represents Hanky 
and Panky, the professors, respectively, of Worldly 
Wisdom and Unworldly Wisdom in the University of 
Bridgeford, as despicable hypocrites who begin by 
attempting to swindle Higgs, whom they suppose to 



Introduction xv 

be a poverty stricken under-keeper of the royal for- 
ests, out of a nugget of gold. And this sort of con- 
temptuous depreciation of the honour and moral recti- 
tude of the professorial class runs throughout the vol- 
ume. 

When v^e come to consider Butler's attack on Chris- 
tian dogma in llrcwhon Revisited, we have to deal with 
a matter very much older and more fundamental in 
his character than his distrust and dislike of profes- 
sors, and we have to allow for the fact that in spite of 
Butler's multifarious interests in other directions, in 
art, in science, in music, and in general literature, his 
basic interest was theology. This idea may seem a 
strange one at first sight, but it will be confirmed by a 
study of Butler's work in its entirety. 

Butler, moreover, was the son of a Canon and the 
grandson of a Bishop, and was brought up in an at- 
mosphere of theological narrowness such as is almost 
iTiconceivaljlc today; and it was as impossible for him 
fo escape being permanently interested in theology as 
it was for his ({uestioning, doubting soul to stay within 
the fold of comfortable conformity. 

The story of his lapse from orthodoxy, while he 
was preparing for ordination in the Anglican (Episco- 
pal) Church has often been told and need not be re- 
peated here. The fact is that though by 1863 Butler 
supposed that he had given up belief in the credibility 
of Christianity, and the authority of its entire ecclesi- 
astical system, theology remained his really dominant 
preoccupation until the end of his life. The reason 
that so little of it appeared in Erewhon is probably 
that he was at that time relieving his mind on the 
subject for a time by writing The Fair Haven, an 



xvi Introduction 

apparent defense of the accuracy of the gospel accounts 
of the resurrection and ascension of Jesus Christ, but 
in reahty a searching and ingenious attack upon the 
veracity and mental equipment of the Evangelists. 
The Fair Haven was published the year after Ere^ 
whon, under a pseudonym, and to Butler's great joy 
was hailed by the Low Church journals of Great 
Britain as a serious work in defense of Christianity. 
It was the revelation of its true authorship and its true 
meaning that did more than anything else to create the 
suspicion and dislike of Butler which the orthodox 
abundantly showed him from that time on. 

In his own preface to Eren^hon Revisited (see page 
v) Butler himself says that it was soon after the pub- 
lication of Erezvhon that it suggested itself to him to 
ask what effect a supposed miracle, such as the ascen- 
sion of the mysterious visitor, Higgs, into the sky in 
his secretly manufactured balloon, would have on the 
religious beliefs and system of a simple, credulous and 
imperfectly civilised people such as the Erewhonians. 
However, it appears that this idea, which Mr. Henry 
Resting Jones in his monumental biography, Samuel 
Butler, Author of Erewhon, calls "the chief motive of 
Erewhon Revisited'^ struck Butler before Erewhon 
was written, for we find it in the concluding paragraph 
of his pamphlet. The Evidence for the Resurrection of 
Jesus Christ as contained in the Four Gospels critically 
examined. This suggestion which is elaborated in The 
Fair Haven (Chapter viii) is as follows: 

To me it appears that if they (the ApostlesJ 
be taken simply as honest but uneducated men, 
subjected to a very unusual course of exciting 



Introduction xvii 

incidents in an enthusiastic age and country, we 
shall find that nothing less than the foundation of 
Christianity could well have come about ... if I 
have realized to myself rightly the effect which a 
well proved miracle would have upon such men 
as the Apostles, in such times as those they lived 
in, I think I may be justified in saying that the 
single supposed miracle of the Resurrection is suf- 
ficient to account for all that followed. 

Some criticism may be made of Butler for the exact 
manner in which he carries out his representation of 
the incidents following on such a supposed miracle in 
Erewhon Revisited. The illegitimate birth of Higgs' 
son of a mother whose name, Yram, is an obvious 
travesty of "Mary," was fiercely assailed by Sir Arthur 
Quiller Couch in the London Daily Nezvs as a scan- 
dalous parallel to the nuptials of Mary and Joseph, 
''offensive by inadvertence almost incredible" ; but But- 
ler absolutely denied any intention of satirising Christ, 
both privately in a letter to Mrs. J. A. Fuller Maitland 
(Feb. 10, 1901) and publicly in a protest against 
Quiller Couch's criticism which caused the latter 
to apologise and admit that he was mistaken. It is 
interesting to note that it is in this protest of his to 
the editor of the Daily News that Butler reveals "the 
second leading idea of the book," that of a father try- 
ing to win the love of a hitherto unknown son by self- 
sacrifice, and succeeding — a pathetic commentary on 
his recognition of the failure of his own filial relation. 
The obvious parodies of creeds, commandments, scrip- 
tures and other portions of the Church's ritual, such 
as: 



xviii Introduction 

"When the righteous man tumeth away from 
the righteousness that he hath committed, and 
doeth that which is a Httle naughty and wrong, 
he will generally be found to have gained in 
amiability what he has lost in righteousness." — 
Sunchild Sayings, Chapter xiii, v. 15. 

may also be considered in bad taste, though Butler 
supposed himself to have removed from the book all 
obvious causes of offense on the suggestion of Mrs. 
J. A. F. Maitland, mentioned above; but it is hardly 
possible for any man to satirise the birth and growth 
of a new religion without more or less parodying the 
religious formularies of his own generation, and Ere- 
whon Revisited is no exception to this. 

The story in the book is simplicity itself. Higgs, 
the discoverer of Erewhon, twenty years after his mys- 
terious evasion, returns to see what the country is now 
like; and discovers that he himself has become the cen- 
tral figure of a new religion, owing to his unexplained 
disappearance sky-ward and from the garbled recollec- 
tion of his claims that he had a father in Heaven. He 
also discovers that he left behind him an unsuspected 
son who has now become a person of some importance 
in the community. He is just in time to attend the 
dedication of the great temple to himself as the Sun- 
child, and endeavors to interrupt the service and reveal 
himself as an ordinar}^ human being. His efforts are 
defeated and he is hustled secretly out of the country 
to prevent an upheaval. 

Although, as has already been explained, the under- 
lying idea in the story is the exploitation of a theolog- 



Introduction xix 

ical conception, no intending reader may fear reading 
the book on that account. Butler's humour is as lively 
as ever, his character-drawing is as satirical, and his 
eye for social defects and absurdities as acute. For 
instance, in his description of the professors at the 
mayoress' reception : 

There was Dr. Downie,* Professor of Logo- 
machy, and perhaps the most subtle dialectician in 
Erewhon. He could say nothing in more words 
than any man of his generation. His text-book 
on The Art of Obscuring Issues had passed 
through ten or twelve editions, and was in the 
hands of all aspirants for academic distinction. 
He had earned a high reputation for sobriety of 
judgment by resolutely refusing to have definite 
views on any subject ; so safe a man was he con- 
sidered, that while still quite young he had been 
appointed to the lucrative post of Thinker in Or- 
dinary to the Royal Family. There was Mr. 
Principal Crank, with his sister Mrs. Quack ; Pro- 
fessors Gabb and Bawl, with their wives and two 
or three erudite daughters. (Chapter viii.) ; 

in his attack on our reformatory system when he de- 
scribes the ^'Deformatory" at Fairmead; in his gibing 
at our fashionable girls' boarding-schools, in his picture 
of Madame Lafrime's school, where the successful 
marriages of the pupils are recorded on the panels of 
the school hall, and in his parody of our up-to-date 
journalism in the report of the temple dedication as 
given in The Sunch'ston Journal, his pen shews no 
sign of having lost its force or point. He deals very 

* "Downy," some thirty years ago, was English semi-slang 
for sly or sophisticated. 



XX Introduction 

trenchantly, moreover, with the ethical value of ideas of 
eternal punishment and eternal bliss in comparing them 
humorously with the classic myths of Sisyphus, th« 
Danaids and Tantalus, while his burlesque of the dif- 
ferences of High Church and Low Church in the two 
schools of the Sunchild followers, who wore their 
clothes respectively wrong side and right side fore- 
most, through a dispute as to Higgs' original method 
of dressing, will be found delightful by all except the 
parties ridiculed. 

More than this, he has put his finger on the fatal 
flaw in the whole mystical basis of religion in the con- 
versations of Higgs with Mr. Balmy * in Chapter 
xiv, the epitome of the matter being where Mr. 
Balmy expresses his belief in the efficacy of spiritual 
enlightenment when the latter is contradicted by facts 
of actual experience : 

"A spiritual enlightenment from within," re- 
turned Mr. Balmy, "is more to be relied on than 
any merely physical affluence from external ob- 
jects. Now, when I shut my eyes, I see the bal- 
loon ascend a little way, but almost immediately 
the heavens open, the horses descend, the balloon 
is transformed, and the glorious pageant careers 
onward till it vanishes into the heaven of heavens. 
Hundreds with whom I have conversed assure 
me that their experience has been the same as 
mine. . . ." (Chapter xiv.) 

Butler seems somewhat more constructive in Ere- 
whon Revisited than he is in Erewhon. In the lesson 

♦Another Victorian slang word signifying much the same 
as our "dippy." 



Introduction xxi 

read at the dedication of the temple to the Sunchild, 
and in Dr. Gurgoyle's book, The Physics of Vicarious 
Existence, we find outlined a definite theory of the na- 
ture of God which corresponds closely to the theory 
already given by Butler in a series of articles in The 
Examiner, of London, and after his death pub- 
lished in a small volume entitled God the Known 
and God the Unknown. This latter is a peculiar 
piece of work, and shows that Butler was very much 
more alive to absurdities and inconsistencies in 
other people's ideas than he was to those in his own; 
but it is evidence that Butler is speaking largely in his 
own person in this instance in Erewhon Revisited. 
There is also (in Chapter xxiv) some sensible advice 
given to the propagators of Sunchildism, which by his 
own confession in the Preface (page vii) is intended 
for the authorities of the Christian Church. 

Apart from this we find a certain amount of worldly 
wisdom which lifts the book to a higher philosophical 
plane than its predecessor. For instance: 

In our spiritual and intellectual world tjwo 
parties more or less antagonistic are equally 
necessary. Those who are at the head of science 
provide us with the one party; those whom we 
call our churchmen are the other. Both are cor- 
rupt, but we can spare neither, for each checks as 
far as it can the corruptions of the other. 
(Chapter xxv.) 

And is there not another place in which it is 
said, 'The fear of the Lord is the beginning of 
wisdom," as though it were not the last word 
upon the subject? If a man should not do evil 



xxii Introduction 

that good may come, so neither should he do good 
that evil may come. (Chapter vii.) 

Not the least important duty of posterity 
towards itself lies in passing righteous judgment 
on the forebears who stand up before it. They 
should be allowed the benefit of a doubt, and pec- 
cadilloes should be ignored; but when no doubt 
exists that a man was ingrainedly mean and cow- 
ardly, his reputation must remain in the Purga- 
tory of Time for a term varying from, say, a 
hundred to two thousand years. After a hundred 
years it may generally come down, though it will 
still be under a cloud. After two thousand years 
it may be mentioned in any society without hold- 
ing up hands in horror. Our sense of moral guilt 
varies inversely as the squares of its distance in 
time and space from ourselves. 

Not so with heroism; this loses no lustre 
through time and distance. Good is gold; it is 
rare, but it will not tarnish. Evil is like dirty 
water — plentiful and foul, but it will run itself 
clear of taint. (Chapter xi.) 

Passages such as these show that Butler had evolved 
considerably since the writing of Erewhon, but there 
is even more difference in the tone of the two books. 
Erewhon Reznsited is less genial and less playful, the 
satire is sharper, the parody more pointed than in the 
earlier volume. He had felt that the literary, scientific, 
and religious worlds had agreed to defeat him by a 
conspiracy of silence, and unquestionably the belief 
had embittered him. It will be noted that the impres- 
sion he gives of Erewhon in the first book is that it is a 
sort of Arcadia. He says of its people that they were : 



Introduction xxiii 

of a physical beauty which was simply amazing, 
the women were vigorous and had a most majes- 
tic gait, their expression was divine. The men 
were as handsome as the women beautiful. . . 



agam : 

they are the very best bred people that ever I fell 
in with. . . 

and again: 

men and women who delight me entirely by their 
simplicity, unconsciousness of self and kindly, 
genial manners. 

There is nothing of this in Erewhon Revisited. The 
Erewhonians are here presented to us precisely as an 
equivalent company of Europeans, and from the ad- 
vertisements of the shops around the College of Spir- 
itual Athletics, it is obvious that bad temper, suspicion, 
and back-biting were no uncommon thing among them. 

Apart from this difference in the general tone, it will 
be obvious, I think, to any reader that Erewhon Revis- 
ited is the more vigorous book of the two, and an 
astonishingly young piece of work for a man of 65 to 
write. 

The history of the book is easy to discover. Al- 
though the main idea around which it is built had been 
in Butler's mind for many years, the first hint that he 
intended to write a sequel to Erezvhon appears in a let- 
ter from him to Miss Savage (the original of Althea 
in The Way of All Flesh) in February, 1877. It was 
not until October, 1896, that he definitely announced 
in conversation to the publisher, Fisher Unwin, that 



xxiv Introduction 

he was going to write the sequel. In 1900 he wrote to 
Dean Pigou, of Bristol, that he intended to "make a 
second journey to Erewhon in the person of my sup- 
posed son, and to report sundry developments." Much 
of the book was written by the beginning of February, 
1 90 1, and in March of that year Longmans refused to 
publish the book, even at Butler's own expense, for 
fear of giving offense to their High Church Anglican 
clientele. This was a blow to Butler, but Bernard 
Shaw now appeared as his good angel. He read the 
manuscript and reported to Butler that he found his 
hero "as interesting as ever," and proceeded to arrange 
a meeting between Butler and Grant Richards, the 
London publisher, who was to be inveigled to lunch by 
the announcement that Bernard Shaw was going to 
have a celebrated author, name not given, to meet him. 
The result was that Grant Richards agreed to publish 
the book, and not only to publish it but to bear the 
entire financial risk — the first time that such a proposi- 
tion had ever been made to Butler ! The book was fin- 
ished at Harwich, during a week-end at the beginning 
of April, 1 901. The first copy reached Butler's hands 
on the nth of October. It was favorably reviewed in 
The Times and The Daily Chronicle, and especially 
well by Edith Sichel in The Monthly Review. The 
motto on the title page of the original edition, taken 
from the Tenth Book of the Iliad — 

Him do I hate even as I hate hell fire 

Who says one thing and hides another in his heart 

voices the life-long protest of Butler against the entire 
machinery of shams and humbug with which the struc- 
ture of civilization seems inextricably interwoven. 



Introduction xxv 

Erewhon Revisited was written more easily and 
with less revision than any other of his books. The 
simple directness of its style is due not only to con- 
tinual conscious effort on Butler's part, but to his use 
in the story of genuine incidents which had happened 
to himself or come within his cognizance. For in- 
stance, Professor Hanky's sermon about the evidences 
for Sunchildism, at the temple dedication ceremonies, 
is taken almost word for word from an appeal in The 
Times of December 8th, 1892, written by Sir G. G. 
Stokes and Lord Halsbury, for the Christian Evidence 
Society. Higgs' experiences as a pavement artist be- 
long by rights to one of the tenants of the house that 
Butler owned at Peckham; Higgs' second journey to 
Erewhon is taken from Butler's own experience at 
Canterbury, New Zealand ; and the honest lawyer, Mr. 
Alfred E. Cathie, of 15 Clifford Inn, is, of course, 
Alfred Emery Cathie, his confidential clerk and friend 
— and so in many other instances. 

Butler's own verdict on Erewhon Revisited con- 
tained in a letter to Mr. O. T. J. Alpers of Christ- 
church, New Zealand, is ''Erewhon Revisited I prefer 
to Erewhon, I confess" ; and it seems not unlikely that 
many readers will agree with him. It is a little diffi- 
cult in this coimtry and at this time to realize the theo- 
logical bitterness which obtained even a few years ago 
in English literary circles, but even making allowance 
for this and for the amount of energy which Butler 
used in fighting it, Erewhon Revisited, I think it will 
be admitted, is a stronger book than the original Ere- 
whon; and, characteristically, perhaps the hardest 
knock, in a book full of hard knocks, is contained in 
the Preface (pages vi-vii) : 



xxvi Introduction 

If I may be allowed for a moment to speak 
about myself, I would say that I have never ceased 
to profess myself a member of the more advanced 
wing of the English Broad Church. What those 
who belong to this wing believe, I believe. What 
they reject, I reject. No two people think abso- 
lutely alike on any subject, but when I converse 
with advanced Broad Churchmen I find myself in 
substantial harmony with them. 

This, in the face of Butler's public and contemp- 
tuous rejection for the previous 40 years of all that 
the English Church held, taught, feared, believed or 
hoped, is about as severe a criticism of the good faith 
of the Anglican clergy as could well be made — for it is 
hardly thinkable that he intended his claim of loyalty 
to the Church to be taken seriously. 

Butler died within six months of the publication of 
this last work of his, and true to his own conception 
of vicarious existence, he is really now beginning to 
live. 

We are not so much better or so much more sensible 
or so much more honest than the Victorians, that we 
can feel Butler is not needed today. Even here he 
might conceivably find a target or two at which to aim 
his barbed shafts — a large and opulent figure of 
Liberty in our sea-gate, for instance, with the Eight- 
eenth Amendment and the Volstead Act in force be- 
hind it might strike him as humorous; or, perhaps, 
the sight of the Mayor of the greatest city in the west- 
ern hemisphere gravely awarding the "Freedom of the 
City'* to an alien who adventures thither for the ac- 
knowledged purpose of peddling the supposititious 
bonds of an imaginary republic. 



Introduction xxvii 

Yes, undoubtedly Samuel Butler died too soon; but 
he left something of himself behind him that is in- 
creasing in strength and influence day by day and year 
by year. His works are a priceless mental tonic to 
those who are inclined to believe that whatever is is 
right, or to jog along comfortably in a mental rut. 
It is hard often to read him without warm indignation 
at the ingenious way in which he can always find some- 
thing to laugh at in our most cherished beliefs and 
institutions; but the idol-breaker has always been 
necessary to the progress of mankind. 

It is difficult, in view of Butler's personal, self-cen- 
tered existence and his complacent admiration for 
Samuel Butler, to call him a really great man; but 
there is no doubt whatever, that if greatness be meas- 
ured by service and usefulness in the kingdom of the 
mind and morals, he does deserve that overworked 
adjective "great." 

He irritates, but he does make the reader think for 
himself — provided, of course, that such a proceeding 
is' possible for him. 

He denies absolutely that there is any virtue in 
moral cowardice, any sanctity in time-honored hum- 
bug or any holiness in official assininity ; and for this 
the men of a later day, who are perhaps a little better 
prepared than his own generation to listen and learn 
and laugh, owe him their gratitude. 

MOREBY ACKLOM. 

New York, 
February, ip^o. 



EREWHON REVISITED 



EREWHON REVISITED 



CHAPTER I 

UPS AND DOWNS OF FORTUNE — MY FATHER STARTS 
FOR EREWHON 

Before telling the story of my father's second visit 
to the remarkable country which he discovered now 
some thirty years since, I should perhaps say a few 
words about his career between the publication of his 
book in 1872, and his death in the early summer of 
1 89 1. I shall thus touch briefly on the causes that occa- 
sioned his failure to maintain that hold on the public 
which he had apparently secured at first. 

His book, as the reader may perhaps know, was pub- 
lished anonymously, and my poor father used to ascribe 
the acclamation with which it was received, to the fact 
that no one knew who it might not have been written 
by. Omne ignotum pro magnifico, and during its 
month of anonymity the book was a frequent topic of 
appreciative comment in good literary circles. Almost 
coincidently with the discovery that he was a mere no- 
body, people began to feel that their admiration had 
been too hastily bestowed, and before long opinion 
turned all the more seriously against him for this very 
reason. The subscription, to which the Lord Mayor 



2 Erewhon Revisited 

had at first given his cordial support, was curtly an- 
nounced as closed before it had been opened a week; 
it had met with so little success that I will not specify 
the amount eventually handed over, not without pro- 
test, to my father ; small, however, at is was, he nar- 
rowly escaped being prosecuted for trying to obtain 
money under false pretences. 

The Geographical Society, which had for a few days 
received him with open arms, was among the first to 
turn upon him — not, so far as I can ascertain, on 
account of the mystery in which he had enshrouded the 
exact whereabouts of Erewhon, nor yet by reason of its 
being persistently alleged that he was subject to fre- 
quent attacks of alcoholic poisoning — but through his 
own want of tact, and a highly-strung nervous state, 
which led him to attach too much importance to his 
own discoveries, and not enough to those of other 
people. This, at least, was my father's version of the 
matter, as I heard it from his own lips in the later 
years of his life. 

"I was still very young,*' he said to me, "and my 
mind was more or less unhinged by the strangeness and 
peril of my adventures." Be this as it may I fear 
there is no doubt that he was injudicious; and an 
ounce of judgment is worth a pound of discovery. 

Hence, in a surprisingly short time, he found him- 
self dropped even by those who had taken him up most 
warmly, and had done most to find him that employ- 
ment as a writer of religious tracts on which his liveli- 
hood was then dependent. The discredit, however, into 
which my father fell, had the effect of deterring any 
considerable number of people from trying to redis- 
cover Erewhon, and thus caused it to remain as un- 



Ups and Downs 3 

known to geographers in general as though it had 
never been found. A few shepherds and cadets at up- 
country stations had, indeed, tried to follow in my 
father's footsteps, during the time when his book was 
still being taken seriously ; but they had most of them 
returned, unable to face the difficulties that had opposed 
them. Some few, however, had not returned, and 
though search was made for them, their bodies had not 
been found. When he reached Erewhon on his second 
visit, my father learned that others had attempted to 
visit the country more recently — probably quite inde- 
pendently of his own book ; and before he had himself 
been in it many hours he gathered what the fate of 
these poor fellows doubtless was. 

Another reason that made it more easy for Erewhon 
to remain unknown, was the fact that the more moun- 
tainous districts, though repeatedly prospected for gold, 
had been pronounced non-auriferous, and as there was 
no sheep or cattle country, save a few river-bed flats 
above the upper gorges of any of the rivers, and no 
game to tempt the sportsman, there was nothing to 
induce people to penetrate into the fastnesses of the 
great snowy range. No more, therefore, being heard 
of Erewhon, my father's book came to be regarded as 
a mere work of fiction, and I have heard quite re- 
cently of its having been seen on a second-hand book- 
stall, marked ''6d., very readable." 

Though there was no truth in the stories about my 
father's being subject to attacks of alcoholic poisoning, 
yet, during the first few years after his return to Eng- 
land, his occasional fits of ungovernable excitement 
gave some colour to the opinion that much of what he 
said he had seen and done might be only subjectively 



4 Erewhon Revisited 

true. I refer more particularly to his interview with 
Chowbok in the wool-shed, and his highly coloured 
description of the statues on the top of the pass leading 
into Erewhon. These were soon set down as forgeries 
of delirium, and it was maliciously urged, that though 
in his book he had only admitted having taken "two 
or three bottles of brandy" with him, he had probably 
taken at least a dozen; and that if on the night before 
he reached the statues he had "only four ounces of 
brandy" left, he must have been drinking heavily for 
the preceding fortnight or three weeks. Those who 
read the following pages will, I think, reject all idea 
that my father was in a state of delirium, not without 
surprise that any one should have ever entertained it. 
It was Chowbok who, if he did not originate these 
calumnies, did much to disseminate and gain credence 
for them. He remained in England for some years, 
and never tired of doing what he could to disparage 
my father. The cunning creature had ingratiated him- 
self with our leading religious societies, especially with 
the more evangelical among them. Whatever doubt 
there might be about his sincerity, there was none about 
his colour, and a coloured convert in those days was 
more than Exeter Hall could resist. Chowbok saw 
that there was no room for him and for my father, 
and declared my poor father's story to be almost 
wholly false. It was true, he said, that he and my 
father had explored the head-waters of the river des- 
cribed in his book, but he denied that my father had 
gone on without him, and he named the river as one 
distant by many thousands of miles from the one it 
really was. He said that after about a fortnight he had 
returned in company with my father, who by that time 



Ups and Downs 5 

had become incapacitated for further travel. At this 
point he would shrug his shoulders, look mysterious, 
and thus say "alcoholic poisoning" even more effec- 
tively than if he had uttered the words themselves. For 
a man's tongue lies often in his shoulders. 

Readers of my father's book will remember that 
Chowbok had given a very different version when he 
had returned to his employer's station; but Time 
and Distance afford cover under which falsehood can 
often do truth to death securely. 

I never understood why 'my father did not bring 
my mother forward to confirm his story. He may 
have done so while I was too young to know anything 
about it. But when people have made up their minds, 
they are impatient of further evidence; my mother, 
moreover, was of a very retiring disposition. The 
Italians say: — 

"Chi lontano va ammogliare 
Sara ingannato, o vorra ingannare." 

"If a man goes far afield for a wife, he will be de- 
ceived — or means deceiving." The proverb is as true 
for women as for men, and my mother was never quite 
happy in her new surroundings. Wilfully deceived she 
assuredly was not, but she could not accustom herself 
to English modes of thought; indeed she never even 
nearly mastered our language ; my father always talked 
with her in Erewhonian, and so did I, for as a child 
she had taught me to do so, and I was as fluent with 
her language as with my father's. In this respect she 
often told me I could pass myself off anywhere in 
Erewhon as a native ; I shared also her personal appear- 
ance, for though not wholly unlike my father, I had 



6 Erewhon Revisited 

taken more closely after my mother. In mind, if I 
may venture to say so, I believe I was more like my 
father. 

I may as well here inform the reader that I was 
born at the end of September, 1871, and was christened 
John, after my grandfather. From what I have said 
above he will readily believe that my earliest experi- 
ences were somewhat squalid. Memories of childhood 
rush vividly upon me when I pass through a low 
London alley and catch the faint sickly smell that 
pervades it — half paraffin, half black-currants, but 
wholly something very different. I have a fancy that 
we lived in Blackmoor Street, off Drury Lane. My 
father, when first I knew of his doing anything at all, 
supported my mother and myself by drawing pictures 
with coloured chalks upon the pavement ; I used some- 
times to watch him, and marvel at the skill with which 
he represented fogs, floods, and fires. These three 
"f's," he would say, were his three best friends, for 
they were easy to do and brought in halfpence freely. 
The return of the dove to the ark was his favourite 
subject. Such a little ark, on such a hazy morning, and 
such a little pigeon — the rest of the picture being cheap 
sky, and still cheaper sea; nothing, I have often heard 
him say, was more popular than this with his clients. 
He held it to be his masterpiece, but would add with 
some naivete that he considered himself a public bene- 
factor for carrying it out in such perishable fashion. 
"At any rate,** he would say, "no one can bequeath one 
of my many replicas to the nation." 

I never learned how much my father earned by his 
profession, but it must have been something consid- 
erable, for we always had enough to eat and drink ; I 



Ups and Downs 7 

imagine that he did better than many a struggling artist 
with more ambitious aims. He was strictly temperate 
during all the time that I knew anything about him, but 
he was not a teetotaler ; I never saw any of the fits of 
nervous excitement which in his earlier years had done 
so much to wreck him. In the evenings, and on days 
when the state of the pavement did not permit him 
to work, he took great pains with my education, which 
he could very well do, for as a boy he had been in the 
sixth form of one of our foremost public schools. I 
found him a patient, kindly instructor, while to my 
mother he was a model husband. Whatever others 
may have said about him, I can never think of him 
without very affectionate respect. 

Things went on quietly enough, as above indicated, 
till I was about fourteen, when by a streak of fortune 
my father became suddenly affluent. A brother of his 
father's had emigrated to Australia in 1851, and had 
amassed great wealth. We knew of his existence, but 
there had been no intercourse between him and my 
father, and we did not even know that he was rich and 
unmarried. He died intestate towards the end of 1885, 
and my father was the only relative he had, except, 
of course, myself, for both my father's sisters had died 
young, and without leaving children. 

The solicitor through whom the news reached us 
was, happily, a man of the highest integrity, and also 
very sensible and kind. He was a Mr. Alfred Emery 
Cathie, of 15 Clifford's Inn, E.C., and my father placed 
himself unreservedly in his hands. I was at once sent 
to a first-rate school, and such pains had my father 
taken with me that I was placed in a higher form than 
might have been expected considering my age. The 



8 Erewhon Revisited 

way in which he had taught me had prevented my feel- 
ing any dislike for study ; I therefore stuck fairly well 
to my books, while not neglecting the games which are 
so important a part of healthy education. Everything 
went well with me, both as regards masters and school- 
fellows ; nevertheless, I was declared to be of a highly 
nervous and imaginative temperament, and the school 
doctor more than once urged our headmaster not to 
push me forward too rapidly — for which I have ever 
since held myself his debtor. 

Early in 1890, I being then home from Oxford 
(where I had been entered in the preceding year), my 
mother died ; not so much from active illness, as from 
what was in reality a kind of maladie du pays. All 
along she had felt herself an exile, and though she had 
borne up wonderfully during my father's long struggle 
with adversity, she began to break as soon as pros- 
perity had removed the necessity for exertion on her 
own part. 

My father could never divest himself of the feeling 
that he had wrecked her life by inducing her to share 
her lot with his own ; to say that he was stricken with 
remorse on losing her is not enough; he had been 
so stricken almost from the first year of his marriage ; 
on her death he was haunted by the wrong he accused 
himself — as it seems to me very unjustly — of having 
done her, for it was neither his fault nor hers — it was 
Ate. 

His unrest soon assumed the form of a burning 
desire to revisit the country in which he and my mother 
had been happier together than perhaps they ever 
again were. I had often heard him betray a hankering 
after a return to Erewhon, disguised so that no one 



Ups and Downs 9 

should recognise him; but as long as my mother lived 
he would not leave her. When death had taken her 
from him, he so evidently stood in need of a complete 
change of scene, that even those friends who had most 
strongly dissuaded him from what they deemed a mad- 
cap enterprise, thought it better to leave him to himself. 
It would have mattered little how much they tried to 
dissuade him, for before long his passionate longing 
for the journey became so overmastering that nothing 
short of restraint in prison or a madhouse could have 
stayed his going ; but we were not easy about him. 

"He had better go," said Mr. Cathie to me, when I 
was at home for the Easter vacation, ''and get it over. 
He is not well, but he is still in the prime of life ; doubt- 
less he will come back with renewed health and will 
settle down to a quiet home life again." 

This, however, was not said till it had become plain 
that in a few days my father would be on his way. 
He had made a new will, and left an ample power of 
attorney with Mr. Cathie — or, as we always called 
him, Alfred — who was to supply me with whatever 
money I wanted : he had put all other matters in order 
in case anything should happen to prevent his ever re- 
turning, and he set out on October i, 1890, more com- 
posed and cheerful than I had seen him for some time 
past. 

I had not realised how serious the danger to my 
father would be if he were recognised while he was 
in Erewhon, for I am ashamed to say that I had not 
yet read his book. I had heard over and over again of 
his flight with my mother in the balloon, and had long 
since read his few opening chapters, but I had found, 
as a boy naturally would, that the succeeding pages 



10 Erewhon Revisited 

were a little dull, and soon put the book aside. My 
father, indeed, repeatedly urged me not to read it, for 
he said there was much in it — more especially in the 
earlier chapters, which I had alone found interesting — 
that he would gladly cancel if he could. ''But there!" 
he had said with a laugh, "what does it matter?" 

He had hardly left, before I read his book from 
end to end, and, on having done so, not only appreci- 
ated the risks that he would have to run, but was struck 
with the wide difference between his character as he had 
himself portrayed it, and the estimate I had formed of 
it from personal knowledge. When, on his return, he 
detailed to me his adventures, the account he gave of 
what he had said and done corresponded with my own 
ideas concerning him; but I doubt not the reader will 
see that the twenty years between his first and second 
visit had modified him even more than so long an in- 
terval might be expected to do. 

I heard from him repeatedly during the first two 
months of his absence, and was surprised to find that 
he had stayed for a week or ten days at more than one 
place of call on his outward journey. On November 26 
he wrote from the port whence he was to start for Ere- 
whon, seemingly in good health and spirits ; and on De- 
cember 27, 1 89 1, he telegraphed for a hundred pounds 
to be wired out to him at this same port. This puzzled 
both Mr. Cathie and myself, for the interval between 
November 26 and December 2^ seemed too short to 
admit of his having paid his visit to Erewhon and 
returned ; as, moreover, he had added the words, "Com- 
ing home," we rather hoped that he had abandoned his 
intention of going there. 

We were also surprised at his wanting so much 



Ups and Downs ii 

money, for he had taken a hundred pounds in gold, 
which, from some fancy, he had stowed in a small 
silver jewel-box that he had given my mother not long 
before she died. He had also taken a hundred pounds' 
worth of gold nuggets, which he had intended to sell in 
Erewhon so as to provide himself with money when he 
got there. 

I should explain that these nuggets would be worth 
in Erewhon fully ten times as much as they would in 
Europe, owing to the great scarcity of gold in that 
country. The Erewhonian coinage is entirely silver — 
which is abundant, and worth much what it is in Eng- 
land — or copper, v/hich is also plentiful; but what we 
should call five pounds' worth of silver money would 
not buy more than one of our half-sovereigns in gold. 

He had put his nuggets into ten brown holland bags, 
and he had had secret pockets made for the old Ere- 
whonian dress which he had worn when he had es- 
caped, so that he need never have more than one bag of 
nuggets accessible at a time. He was not likely, there- 
fore to have been robbed. His passage to the port 
above referred to had been paid before he started, and 
it seemed impossible that a man of his very inexpensive 
habits should have spent two hundred pounds in a sin- 
gle month — for the nuggets would be immediately con- 
vertible in an English colony. There was nothing, 
however, to be done but to cable out the money and 
wait my father's arrival. 

Returning for a moment to my father's old Ere- 
whonian dress, I should say that he had preserved it 
simply as a memento and without any idea that he 
should again want it. It was not the court dress that 
had been provided for him on the occasion of his visit 



12 Erewhon Revisited 

to the king and queen, but the everyday clothing that 
he had been ordered to wear when he was put in 
prison, though his EngHsh coat, waistcoat, and trousers 
had been allowed to remain in his own possession. 
These, I had seen from his book, had been presented 
by him to the queen (with the exception of two but- 
tons, which he had given to Yram as a keepsake), and 
had been preserved by her displayed upon a wooden 
dummy. The dress in which he had escaped had been 
soiled during the hours that he and my mother had 
been in the sea, and had also suffered from neglect dur- 
ing the years of his poverty; but he wished to pass 
himself off as a common peasant or working-man, so 
he preferred to have it set in order as might best be 
done, rather than copied. 

So cautious was he in the matter of dress that he 
took with him the boots he had worn on leaving 
Erewhon, lest the foreign make of his English boots 
should arouse suspicion. They were nearly new, and 
when he had had them softened and well greased, he 
found he could still wear them quite comfortably. 

But to return. He reached home late at night one 
day at the beginning of February, and a glance was 
enough to show that he was an altered man. 

"What is the matter?" said I, shocked at his appear- 
ance. "Did you go to Erewhon, and were you ill- 
treated there ?" 

"I went to Erewhon," he said, "and I was not ill- 
treated there, but I have been so shaken that I fear 
I shall quite lose my reason. Do not ask me more now. 
I will tell you about it all to-morrow. Let me have 
something to eat, and go to bed." 

When we met at breakfast next morning, he greeted 



Ups and Downs 13 

me with all his usual warmth of affection, but he was 
still taciturn. *'l will begin to tell you about it," he 
said, "after breakfast. Where is your dear mother? 
How was it that I have ..." 

Then of a sudden his memory returned, and he burst 
into tears. 

I now saw, to my horror, that his mind was gone. 
When he recovered, he said: "It has all come back 
again, but at times now I am a blank, and every week 
am more and more so. I daresay I shall be sensible 
now for several hours. We will go into the study after 
breakfast, and I will talk to you as long as I can do so." 

Let the reader spare me, and let me spare the reader 
any description of what we both of us felt. 

When we were in the study, my father said, "My 
dearest boy, get pen and paper and take notes of what 
I tell you. It will all be disjointed; one day I shall re- 
member this, and another that, but there will not be 
many more days on which I shall remember anything 
at all. I cannot write a coherent page. You, when 
I am gone, can piece what I tell you together, and tell 
it as I should have told it if I had been still sound. 
But do not publish it yet ; it might do harm to those 
dear good people. Take the notes now, and arrange 
them the sooner the better, for you may want to ask 
me questions, and I shall not be here much longer. 
Let publishing wait till you are confident that publica- 
tion can do no harm ; and above all, say nothing to be- 
tray the whereabouts of Erewhon, beyond admitting 
(which I fear I have already done) that it is in the 
Southern hemisphere." 

These instructions I have religiously obeyed. For 
the first days after his return, my father had few at- 



14 Erewhon Revisited 

tacks of loss of memory, and I was in hopes that his 
former health of mind would return when he found 
himself in his old surroundings. During these days 
he poured forth the story of his adventures so fast, 
that if I had not had a fancy for acquiring shorthand, 
I should not have been able to keep pace with him. I 
repeatedly urged him not to overtax his strength, but 
he was oppressed by the fear that if he did not speak 
at once, he might never be able to tell me all he had 
to say; I had, therefore, to submit, though seeing 
plainly enough that he was only hastening the complete 
paralysis which he so greatly feared. 

Sometimes his narrative would be coherent for pages 
together, and he could answer any questions without 
hesitation ; at others, he was now here and now there, 
and if I tried to keep him to the order of events he 
would say that he had forgotten intermediate inci- 
dents, but that they would probably come back to him, 
and I should perhaps be able to put them in their 
proper places. 

After about ten days he seemed satisfied that I had 
got all the facts, and that with the help of the pam- 
phlets which he had brought with him I should be able 
to make out a connected story. "Remember,*' he said, 
"that I thought I was quite well so long as I was in 
Erewhon, and do not let me appear as anything else." 

When he had fully delivered himself, he seemed 
easier in his mind, but before a month had passed he 
became completely paralysed, and though he lingered 
till the beginning of June, he was seldom more than 
dimly conscious of what was going on around him. 

His death robbed me of one who had been a very 
kind and upright elder brother rather than a father; 



Ups and Downs 15 

and so strongly have I felt his influence still present, 
living and working, as I believe for better within me, 
that I did not hesitate to copy the epitaph which he saw 
in the Musical Bank at Fairmead,* and to have it in- 
scribed on the very simple monument which he desired 
should alone mark his grave. 



The foregoing was written in the summer of 1891 ; 
what I now add should be dated December 3, 1900. If, 
in the course of my work, I have misrepresented my 
father, as I fear I may have sometimes done, I would 
ask my readers to remember that no man can tell 
another's story without some involuntary misrepresen- 
tation both of facts and characters. They will, of 
course, see that *'Erewhon Revisited" is written by one 
who has far less literary skill than the author of "Ere- 
whon" ; but again I would ask indulgence on the score 
of youth, and the fact that this is my first book. It 
was written nearly ten years ago, i.e., in the months 
from March to August, 1891, but for reasons already 
given it could not then be made public. I have now 
received permission, and therefore publish the follow- 
ing chapters, exactly, or very nearly exactly, as they 
were left when I had finished editing my father's dia- 
ries, and the notes I took down from his own mouth — 
with the exception, of course, of these last few lines, 
hurriedly written as I am on the point of leaving Eng- 
land, of the additions I made in 1892, on returning 
from my own three hours' stay in Erewhon, and of the 
Postscript. 

* See Chapter X. 



CHAPTER II 

TO THE FOOT OF THE PASS INTO EREWHON 

When my father reached the colony for which he 
had left England some twenty-tvv^o years previously, 
he bought a horse, and started up country on the even- 
ing of the day after his arrival, which was, as I have 
said, on one of the last days of November, 1890. He 
had taken an English saddle with him, and a couple 
of roomy and strongly made saddle-bags. In these he 
packed his money, his nuggets, some tea, sugar, to- 
bacco, salt, a flask of brandy, matches, and as many 
ship's biscuits as he thought he was likely to want ; he 
took no meat, for he could supply himself from some 
accommodation-house or sheep-station, when nearing 
the point after which he would have to begin camping 
out. He rolled his Erewhonian dress and small toilette 
necessaries inside a warm red blanket, and strapped 
the roll on to the front part of his saddle. On to other 
D's, with which his saddle was amply provided, he 
strapped his Erewhonian boots, a tin pannikin, and a 
billy that would hold about a quart. I should, per- 
haps, explain to English readers that a billy is a tin 
can, the name for which (doubtless of French Cana- 
dian origin) is derived from the words ''faire houillir." 
He also took with him a pair of hobbles and a small 
hatchet. 

He spent three whole days in riding across the plains, 

16 



To the Pass 17 

and was struck with the very small signs of change that 
he could detect, but the fall in wool, and the failure, 
so far, to establish a frozen meat trade, had prevented 
any material development of the resources of the coun- 
try. When he had got to the front ranges, he followed 
up the river next to the north of the one that he had 
explored years ago, and from the head waters of which 
he had been led to discover the only practicable pass 
into Erewhon. He did this, partly to avoid the terribly 
dangerous descent on to the bed of the more northern 
river, and partly to escape being seen by shepherds or 
bullock-drivers who might remember him. 

If he had attempted to get through the gorge of this 
river in 1870, he would have found it impassable; but 
a few river-bed flats had been discovered above the 
gorge, on which there was now a shepherd's hut, and 
on the discovery of these flats a narrow horse track had 
been made from one end of the gorge to the other. 

He was hospitably entertained at the shepherd's 
hut just mentioned, which he reached on Monday, De- 
cember I. He told the shepherd in charge of it that 
he had come to see if he could find traces of a large 
wingless bird, whose existence had been reported as 
having been discovered among the extreme head 
waters of the river. 

"Be careful, sir," said the shepherd; "the river is 
very dangerous ; several people — one only about a year 
ago — have left this hut, and though their horses and 
their camps have been found, their bodies have not. 
When a great fresh comes down, it would carry a body 
out to sea in twenty-four hours." 

He evidently had no idea that there was a pass 



l8 Erewhon Revisited 

through the ranges up the river, which might explain 
the disappearance of an explorer. 

Next day my father began to ascend the river. There 
v^^as so much tangled growth still unburnt wherever 
there was room for it to grow, and so much swamp, 
that my father had to keep almost entirely to the river- 
bed — and here there was a good deal of quicksand. 
The stones also were often large for some distance to- 
gether, and he had to cross and recross streams of the 
river more than once, so that though he travelled all 
day with the exception of a couple of hours for dinner, 
he had not made more than some five and twenty miles 
when he reached a suitable camping ground, where he 
unsaddled his horse, hobbled him, and turned him out 
to feed. The grass was beginning to seed, so that 
though it was none too plentiful, what there was of it 
made excellent feed. 

He lit his fire, made himself some tea, ate his cold 
mutton and biscuits, and lit his pipe, exactly as he had 
done twenty years before. There was the clear starlit 
sky, the rushing river, and the stunted trees on the 
mountain-side; the woodhens cried, and the "more- 
pork'' hooted out her two monotonous notes exactly as 
they had done years since ; one moment, and time had 
so flown backwards that youth came bounding back 
to him with the return of his youth's surroundings ; the 
next, and the intervening twenty years — most of them 
grim ones — rose up mockingly before him, and the 
buoyancy of hope yielded to the despondency of ad- 
mitted failure. By and by buoyancy reasserted itself, 
and, soothed by the peace and beauty of the night, he 
wrapped himself up in his blanket and dropped off into 
a dreamless slumber. 



To the Pass 19 

Next morning, i.e.j December 3, he rose soon after 
dawn, bathed in a backwater of the river, got his break- 
fast, found his horse on the river-bed, and started as 
soon as he had duly packed and loaded. He had now 
to cross streams of the river and recross them more 
often than on the preceding day, and this, though his 
horse took well to the water, required care ; for he was 
anxious not to wet his saddle-bags, and it was only 
by crossing at the wide, smooth, water above a rapid, 
and by picking places where the river ran in two or 
three streams, that he could find fords where his prac- 
tised eye told him that the water would not be above 
his horse's belly — for the river was of great volume. 
Fortunately, there had been a late fall of snow on the 
higher ranges, and the river was, for the summer sea- 
son, low. 

Towards evening, having travelled, so far as he 
could guess, some twenty or five and twenty miles ( for 
he had made another mid-day halt), he reached the 
place, which he easily recognised, as that where he 
had camped before crossing to the pass that led into 
Erewhon. It was the last piece of ground that could 
be called a flat (though it was in reality only the sloping 
delta of a stream that descended from the pass) before 
reaching a large glacier that had encroached on the 
river-bed, which it traversed at right angles for a con- 
siderable distance. 

Here he again camped, hobbled his horse, and turned 
him adrift, hoping that he might again find him some 
two or three months hence, for there was a good deal 
of sweet grass here and there, with sow-thistle and 
anise ; and the coarse tussock grass would be in full seed 
shortly, which alone would keep him going for as long 



20 Erewhon Revisited 

a time as my father expected to be away. Little did 
he think that he should want him again so shortly. 

Having attended to his horse, he got his supper, and 
while smoking his pipe congratulated himself on the 
way in which something had smoothed away all the 
obstacles that had so nearly baffled him on his earlier 
journey. Was he being lured on to his destruction by 
some malicious fiend, or befriended by one who had 
compassion on him and wished him well? His natu- 
rally sanguine temperament incHned him to adopt the 
friendly spirit theory, in the peace of which he again 
laid himself down to rest, and slept soundly from dark 
till dawn. 

In the morning, though the water was somewhat icy, 
he again bathed, and then put on his Erewhonian boots 
and dress. He stowed his European clothes, with some 
difficulty, into his saddle-bags. Herein also he left his 
case full of English sovereigns, his spare pipes, his 
purse, which contained two pounds in gold and seven or 
eight shillings, part of his stock of tobacco, and what- 
ever provision was left him, except the meat — which 
he left for sundry hawks and parrots that were eyeing 
his proceedings apparently without fear of man. His 
nuggets he concealed in the secret pockets of which I 
have already spoken, keeping one bag alone acces- 
sible. 

He had had his hair and beard cut short on ship- 
board the day before he landed. These he now dyed 
with a dye that he had brought from England, and 
which in a few minutes turned them very nearly black. 
He also stained his face and hands deep brown. He 
hung his saddle and bridle, his English boots, and his 
saddle-bags on the highest bough that he could reach, 



To the Pass 21 

and made them fairly fast with strips of flax leaf, for 
thene was some stunted flax growing on the ground 
where he had camped. He feared that, do what he 
might, they would not escape the inquisitive thievish- 
ness of the parrots, whose strong beaks could easily cut 
leather ; but he could do nothing more. It occurs to me, 
though my father never told me so, that it was perhaps 
with a view to these birds that he had chosen to put his 
English sovereigns into a metal box, with a clasp to 
it which would defy them. , 

He made a roll of his blanket, and slung it over his 
shoulder; he also took his pipe, tobacco, a little tea, a 
few ship's biscuits, and his billy and pannikin ; matches 
and salt go without saying. When he had thus ordered 
everything as nearly to his satisfaction as he could, he 
looked at his watch for the last time, as he believed, 
till many weeks should have gone by, and found it to 
be about seven o'clock. Remembering what trouble it 
had got him into years before, he took down his sad- 
dle-bags, reopened them, and put the watch inside. He 
then set himself to climb the mountain side, towards 
the saddle on which he had seen the statues. 



CHAPTER III 

MY FATHER WHILE CAMPING IS ACCOSTED BY 
PROFESSORS HANKY AND PANKY 

My father found the ascent more fatiguing than 
he remembered it to have been. The climb, he said, 
was steady, and took him between four and five hours, 
as near as he could guess, now that he had no watch; 
but it offered nothing that could be called a difficulty, 
and the watercourse that came down from the saddle 
was a sufficient guide ; once or twice there were water- 
falls, but they did not seriously delay him. 

After he had climbed some three thousand feet, he 
began to be on the alert for some sound of ghostly 
chanting from the statues ; but he heard nothing, and 
toiled on till he came to a sprinkling of fresh snow- 
part of the fall which he had observed on the preceding 
day as having whitened the higher mountains ; he knew, 
therefore, that he must now be nearing the saddle. The 
snow grew rapidly deeper, and by the time he reached 
the statues the ground was covered to a depth of two 
or three inches. 

He found the statues smaller than he had expected. 
He had said in his book — written many months after 
he had seen them — that they were about six times the 
size of life, but he now thought that four or five times 
would have been enough to say. Their mouths were 
much clogged with snow, so that even though there had 

22 



Hanky and Panky 23 

been a strong wind (which there was not) they would 
not have chanted. In other respects he found them not 
less mysteriously impressive than at first. He walked 
two or three times all round them, and then went on. 

The snow did not continue far down, but before 
long my father entered a thick bank of cloud, and had 
to feel his way cautiously along the stream that de- 
scended from the pass. It was some two hours before 
he emerged into clear air, and found himself on the 
level bed of an old lake now grassed over. He had 
quite forgotten this feature of the descent — perhaps the 
clouds had hung over it ; he was overjoyed, however, to 
find that the flat ground abounded with a kind of quail, 
larger than ours, and hardly, if at all, smaller than a 
partridge. The abundance of these quails surprised 
him, for he did not remember them as plentiful any- 
where on the Erewhonian side of the mountains. 

The Erewhonian quail, like its now nearly, if not 
quite, extinct New Zealand congener, can take three 
successive flights of a few yards each, but then be- 
comes exhausted; hence quails are only found on 
ground that is never burned, and where there are no 
wild animals to molest them; the cats and dogs that 
accompany European civilisation soon exterminate 
them; my father, therefore, felt safe in concluding that 
he was still far from any village. Moreover, he could 
see no sheep or goat's dung ; and this surprised him, for 
he thought he had found signs of pasturage much 
higher than this. Doubtless, he said to himself, when 
he wrote his book he had forgotten how long the de- 
scent had been. But it was odd, for the grass was good 
feed enough, and ought, he considered, to have been 
well stocked. 



24 Erewhon Revisited 

Tired with his climb, during which he had not 
rested to take food, but had eaten biscuits, as he 
walked, he gave himself a good long rest, and when 
refreshed, he ran down a couple of dozen quails, some 
of which he meant to eat when he camped for the night, 
while the others would help him out of a difficulty 
which had been troubling him for some time. 

What was he to say when people asked him, as they 
were sure to do, how he was living? And how was he 
to get enough Erewhonian money to keep him going 
till he could find some safe means of selling a few of 
his nuggets? He had had a little Erewhonian money 
when he went up in the balloon, but had thrown it over, 
with everything else except the clothes he wore and his 
MSS., when the balloon was nearing the water. He 
had nothing with him that he dared offer for sale, and 
though he had plenty of gold, was in reality penniless. 

When, therefore, he saw the quails, he again felt as 
though some friendly spirit was smoothing his way 
before him. What more easy than to sell them at Cold- 
harbour (for so the name of the town in which he had 
been imprisoned should be translated), where he knew 
they were a delicacy, and would fetch him the value 
of an English shilling a piece? 

It took him between two and three hours to catch 
two dozen. When he had thus got what he considered 
a sufficient stock, he tied their legs together with rushes, 
and ran a stout stick through the whole lot. Soon 
afterwards he came upon a wood of stunted pines, 
which, though there was not much undergrowth, never- 
theless afforded considerable shelter and enabled him to 
gather wood enough to make himself a good fire. This 
was acceptable, for though the days were long, it was 



Hanky and Panky 25 

now evening, and as soon as the sun had gone the air 
became crisp and frosty. 

Here he resolved to pass the night. He chose a part 
where the trees were thickest, Ht his fire, plucked and 
cleaned four quails, filled his billy with water from the 
stream hard by, made tea in his pannikin, grilled two 
of his birds on the embers, ate them, and when he had 
done all this, he lit his pipe and began to think things 
over. 

*'So far so good," said he to himself ; but hardly 
had the words passed through his mind before he was 
startled by the sound of voices, still at some distance, 
but evidently drawing towards him. 

He instantly gathered up his billy, pannikin, tea, 
biscuits, and blanket, all of which he had determined 
to discard and hide on the following morning ; every- 
thing that could betray him he carried full haste into 
the wood some few yards off, in the direction opposite 
to that from which the voices were coming, but he let 
his quails lie where they were, and put his pipe and 
tobacco in his pocket. 

The voices drew nearer and nearer, and it was all 
my father could do to get back and sit down innocently 
by his fire, before he could hear what was being said. 

'Thank goodness," said one of the speakers (of 
course in the Erewhonian language), "we seem to be 
finding somebody at last. I hope it is not some 
poacher; we had better be careful." 

"Nonsense !" said the other. "It must be one of the 
rangers. No one would dare to light a fire while poach- 
ing on the King's preserves. What o'clock do you 
make it?" 

"Half after nine." And the watch was still in the 



26 Erewhon Revisited 

speaker's hand as he emerged from darkness into the 
glowing light of the fire. My father glanced at it, 
and saw that it was exactly like the one he had worn on 
entering Erewhon nearly twenty years previously. 

The watch, however, was a very small matter; the 
dress of these two men (for there were only two) was 
far more disconcerting. They were not in the Ere- 
whonian costume. The one was dressed like an Eng- 
lishman or would-be Englishman, while the other was 
wearing the same kind of clothes but turned the wrong 
way round, so that when his face was towards my 
father his body seemed to have its back towards him, 
and znce versa. The man's head, in fact, appeared to 
have been screwed right round; and yet it was plain 
that if he were stripped he would be found built like 
other people. 

What could it all mean ? The men were about fifty 
years old. They were well-to-do people, well clad, well 
fed, and were felt instinctively by my father to belong 
to the academic classes. That one of them should be 
dressed like a sensible Englishman dismayed my father 
as much as that the other should have a watch, and 
look as if he had just broken out of Bedlam, or as King 
Dagobert must have looked if he had worn all his 
clothes as he is said to have worn his breeches. Both 
wore their clothes so easily — for he who wore them 
reversed had evidently been measured with a view to 
this absurd fashion^ — that it was plain their dress was 
habitual. 

My father was alarmed as well as astounded, for he 
saw that what little plan of a campaign he had formed 
must be reconstructed, and he had no idea in what di- 
rection his next move should be taken; but he was a 



Hanky and Panky 27 

ready man, and knew that when people have taken any 
idea into their heads, a little confirmation will fix it. 
A first idea is like a strong^ seedling; it will grow if 
it can. 

In less time than it will have taken the reader to 
get through the last foregoing paragraphs, my father 
took up the cue furnished him by the second speaker. 

**Yes," said he, going boldly up to this gentleman, 
"I am one of the rangers, and it is my duty to ask you 
what you are doing here upon the King^s preserves." 

"Quite so, my man," was the rejoinder. "We have 
been to see the statues at the head of the pass, and have 
a permit from the Mayor of Sunch'ston to enter upon 
the preserves. We lost ourselves in the thick fog, both 
going and coming back." 

My father inwardly blessed the fog. He did not 
catch the name of the town, but presently found that 
it was commonly pronounced as I have written it. 

"Be pleased to show it me," said my father in his 
politest manner. On this a document was handed to 
him. 

I will here explain that I shall translate the names of 
men and places, as well as the substance of the docu- 
ment; and I shall translate all names in future. In- 
deed I have just done so in the case of Sunch'ston. As 
an example, let me explain that the true Erewhonian 
names for Hanky and Panky, to whom the reader will 
be immediately introduced, are Sukoh and Sukop — 
names too cacophonous to be read with pleasure by the 
English public. I must ask the reader to believe' 
that in all cases I am doing my best to give the spirit 
of the original name. 

I would also express my regret that my father did 



28 Erewhon Revisited 

not either uniformly keep to the true Erewhonian 
names, as in the cases of Senoj, Nosnibor, Ydgrun, 
Thims, &c. — names which occur constantly in Ere- 
whon — or else invariably invent a name, as he did 
whenever he considered the true name impossible. My 
poor mother's name, for example, was really Nna 
Haras, and Mahaina's Enaj Ysteb, which he dared 
not face. He, therefore, gave these characters the 
first names that euphony suggested, without any at- 
tempt at translation. Rightly or wrongly, I have de- 
termined to keep consistently to translation for all 
names not used in my father's book; and throughout, 
whether as regards names or conversations, I shall 
translate with the freedom without which no transla- 
tion rises above construe level. 

Let us now return to the permit. The earlier part 
of the document was printed, and ran as follows : 

"Extracts from the Act for the afforesting of cer- 
tain lands lying between the town of Sunchildston, for- 
merly called Coldharbour, and the mountains which 
bound the kingdom of Erewhon, passed in the year 
Three, being the eighth year of the reign of his Most 
Gracious Majesty King Well-beloved the Twenty- 
Second. 

'Whereas it is expedient to prevent any of his 
Majesty's subjects from trying to cross over into un- 
known lands beyond the mountains, and in the manner 
to protect his Majesty's kingdom from intrusion on the 
part of foreign devils, it is hereby enacted that certain 
lands, more particularly described hereafter, shall be 
afforested and set apart as a hunting-ground for his 
Majesty's private use. 



Hanky and Panky 29 

*'It is also enacted that the Rangers and Under- 
rangers shall be required to immediately kill without 
parley any foreign devil whom they may encounter 
coming from the other side of the mountains. They 
are to weight the body, and throw it into the Blue Pool 
under the waterfall shown on the plan hereto annexed ; 
but on pain of imprisonment for life they shall not re- 
serve to their own use any article belonging to the de- 
ceased. Neither shall they divulge what they have done 
to any one save the Head Ranger, who shall report the 
circumstances of the case fully and minutely to his 
Majesty. 

''As regards any of his Majesty's subjects who may 
be taken while trespassing on his Majesty's preserves 
without a special permit signed by the Mayor of Sun- 
childston, or any who may be convicted of poaching 
on the said preserves, the Rangers shall forthwith ar- 
rest them and bring them before the Mayor of Sun- 
childston, who shall enquire into their antecedents, and 
punish them with such term of imprisonment, with 
hard labour, as he may think fit, provided that no such 
term be of less duration that twelve calendar months. 

"For the further provisions of the said Act, those 
whom it may concern are referred to the Act in full, 
a copy of which may be seen at the official residence of 
the Mayor of Sunchildston." 

Then followed in MS. ''XIX. xii. 29. Permit Pro- 
fessor Hanky, Royal Professor of Worldly Wisdom, at 
Bridge ford, seat of learning, city of the people who 
are above suspicion, and Professor Panky, Royal Pro- 
fessor of Unworldly Wisdom in the said city, or either 
of them" [here the MS. ended, the rest of the permit 
being in print] *'to pass freely during the space of 



30 Erewhon Revisited 

forty-eight hours from the date hereof, over the King's 
preserves, provided, under pain of imprisonment with 
hard labour for twelve months, that they do not kill, 
nor cause to be killed, nor eat, if another have killed, 
any one or more of his Majesty's quails." 

The signature was such a scrawl that my father 
could not read it, but underneath was printed, "Mayor 
of Sunchildston, formerly called Coldharbour." 

What a mass of information did not my father 
gather as he read, but what a far greater mass did he 
not see that he must get hold of ere he could recon- 
struct his plans intelligently. 

"The year three," indeed ; and XIX. xii. 20, in Ro- 
man and Arabic characters ! There were no such char- 
acters when he was in Erewhon before. It flashed 
upon him that he had repeatedly shewn them to the 
Nosnibors, and had once even written them down. It 
could not be that . . . No, it was impossible ; and yet 
there was the European dress, aimed at by the one Pro- 
fessor, and attained by the other. Again "XIX." what 
was that? "xii." might do for December, but it was 
now the 4th of December not the 29th. "Afforested," 
too ? Then that was why he had seen no sheep tracks. 
And how about the quails he had so innocently killed ? 
What would have happened if he had tried to sell them 
in Coldharbour? What other like fatal error might he 
not ignorantly commit? And why had Coldharbour 
become Sunchildston? 

These thoughts raced through my poor father's 
brain as he slowly perused the paper handed to him 
by the Professors. To give himself time he feigned to 
be a poor scholar, but when he had delayed as long as 



Hanky and Panky 31 

he dared, he returned it to the one who had given it 
him. Without changing a muscle he said — 

"Your permit, sir, is quite regular. You can either 
stay here the night or go on to Sunchildston as you 
think fit. May I ask which of you two gentlemen is 
Professor Hanky, and which Professor Panky?" 

"My name is Panky," said the one who had the 
watch, who wore his clothes reversed, and who had 
thought my father might be a poacher. 

"And mine Hanky," said the other. 

"What do you think, Panky," he added, turning to 
his brother Professor, "had we not better stay here 
till sunrise? We are both of us tired, and this fellow 
can make us a good fire. It is very dark, and there will 
be no moon this two hours. We are hungry, but we 
can hold out till we get to Sunchildston; it cannot be 
more than eight or nine miles further down." 

Panky assented, but then, turning sharply to my 
father, he said, "My man, what are you doing in the 
forbidden dress? Why are you not in ranger's uni- 
form, and what is the meaning of all those quails?" 
For his seedling idea that my father was in reality a 
poacher was doing its best to grow. 

Quick as thought my father answered, "The Head 
Ranger sent me a message this morning to deliver him 
three dozen quails at Sunchildston by to-morrow after- 
noon. As for the dress, we can run the quails down 
quicker in it, and he says nothing to us so long as we 
only wear out old clothes and put on our uniforms be- 
fore we near the town. My uniform is in the ranger's 
shelter an hour and a half higher up the valley." 

"See what comes," said Panky, "of having a whip- 
persnapper not yet twenty years old in the responsible 



32 Erewhon Revisited 

post of Head Ranger. As for this fellow, he may be 
speaking the truth, but I distrust him." 

"The man is all right, Panky," said Hanky, "and 
seems to be a decent fellow enough." Then to my 
father, "How many brace have you got?" And he 
looked at them a little wistfully. 

"I have been at it all day, sir, and I have only 
got eight brace. I must run down ten more brace to- 
morrow." 

"I see, I see.'* Then, turning to Panky he said, "Of 
course, they are wanted for the Mayor's banquet on 
Sunday. By the way, we have not yet received our in- 
vitation; I suppose we shall find it when we get back 
to Sunchildston." 

"Sunday, Sunday, Sunday!" groaned my father in- 
wardly; but he changed not a muscle of his face, and 
said stolidly to Professor Hanky, "I think you must be 
right, sir; but there was nothing said about it to me. 
I was only told to bring the birds." 

Thus tenderly did he water the Professor's second 
seedling. But Panky had his seedling too, and Cain- 
like, was jealous that Hanky's should flourish while his 
own was withering. 

"And what, pray, my man," he said somewhat per- 
emptorily to my father, "are those two plucked quails 
doing? Were you to deliver them plucked? And 
what bird did those bones belong to which I see lying 
by the fire with the flesh all eaten off them? Are the 
under-rangers allowed not only to wear the forbidden 
dress but to eat the King's quails as well ?" 

The form in which the question was asked gave my 
father his cue. He laughed heartily, and said, "Why, 
sir, those plucked birds are landrails, not quails, and 



Hanky and Panky 33 

those bones are landrail bones. Look at this thigh- 
bone ; was there ever a quail with such a bone as that ?" 

I cannot say whether or no Professor Panky was 
really deceived by the sweet effrontery with which my 
father proffered him the bone. If he was taken in, 
his answer was) dictated simply by a donnish unwil- 
lingness to allow any one to be better informed on any 
subject than he was himself. 

My father, when I suggested this to him, would not 
hear of it. "Oh, no," he said; "the man knew well 
enough that I was lying." However this may be, the 
Professor's manner changed. 

"You are right," he said, "I thought they were 
landrail bones, but was not sure till I had one in my 
hand. I see, too, that the plucked birds are landrails, 
but there is little light, and I have not often seen them 
without their feathers." 

"I think," said my father to me, "that Hanky knew 
what his friend meant, for he said, Tanky, I am very 
hungry.' " 

"Oh, Hanky, Hanky," said the other, modulating his 
harsh voice till it was quite pleasant. "Don't corrupt 
the poor man." 

"Panky, drop that ; we are not at Bridgef ord now ; I 
am very hungry, and I believe half those birds are not 
quails but landrails." 

My father saw he was safe. He said, "Perhaps 
some of them might prove to be so, sir, under certain 
circumstances. I am a poor man, sir." 

"Come, come," said Hanky; and he slipped a sum 
equal to about half-a-crown into my father's hand. 

"I do not know what you mean, sir," said my father, 



34 Erewhon Revisited 

"and if I did, half-a-crown would not be nearly 
enough." 

"Hanky/' said Panky, "you must get this fellow to 
give you lessons." 



CHAPTER IVi 



my father overhears more of hanky and 
panky's conversation 



My father, schooled under adversity, knew that it 
was never well to press advantage too far. He took 
the equivalent of five shillings for three brace, which 
was somewhat less than the birds would have been 
worth when things were as he had known them. More- 
over, he consented to take a shilling's worth of Musical 
Bank money, which (as he has explained in his book) 
has no appreciable value outside these banks. He did 
this because he knew that it would be respectable to 
be seen carrying a little Musical Bank money, and also 
because he wished to give some of it to the British 
Museum, where he knew that this curious coinage was 
unrepresented. But the coins struck him as being much 
thinner and smaller than he had remembered them. 

It was Panky, not Hanky, who had given him the 
Musical Bank money. Panky was the greater humbug 
of the two, for he would humbug even himself — a 
thing, by the way, not very hard to do ; and yet he was 
the less successful humbug, for he could humbug no 
one who was worth humbugging — not for long. 
Hanky's occasional frankness put people off their 
guard. He was the mere common, superficial, perfunc- 
tory Professor, who, being a Professor, would of 
course profess, but would not lie more than was in the 

35 



36 Erewhon Revisited 

bond ; he was log-rolled and log-rolling, but still, in a 
robust wolfish fashion, human. 

Panky, on the other hand was hardly human ; he 
had thrown himself so earnestly into his work, that 
he had become a living lie. If he had had to play the 
part of Othello he would have blacked himself all over 
and very likely smothered his Desdemona in good 
earnest. Hanky would hardly have blacked himself 
behind the ears and his Desdemona would have been 
quite safe. 

Philosophers are like quails in the respect that they 
can take two or three flights of imagination but rarely 
more without an interval of repose. The Professors 
had imagined my father to be a poacher and a ranger ; 
they had imagined the quails to be wanted for Sun- 
day's banquet; they had imagined that they imagined 
(at least Panky had) that they were about to eat 
landrails ; they were now exhausted and cowered down 
into the grass of their ordinary conversation paying 
no more attention to my father than if he had been a 
dog. He, poor man, drank in every word they said, 
while seemingly intent on nothing but his quails, each 
one of which he cut up with a knife borrowed from 
Hanky. Two had been plucked already, so he laid 
these at once upon the clear embers. 

"I do not know wha.' we are to do with ourselves," 
said Hanky, "till Sunday. To-day is Thursday — it 
is the twenty-ninth, is it not? Yes, of course it is — 
Sunday is the first. Besides, it is on our permit. To- 
morrow we can rest; what, I wonder, can we do on 
Saturday? But the others will be here then, and we 
can tell them about the statues." 



The Professors Converse 37 

**Yes, but mind you do not blurt out anything about 
the landrails." 

''I think we may tell Dr. Downie." 

*Tell nobody," said Panky. 

Then they talked about the statues, concerning which 
it was plain that nothing was known. But my father 
soon broke in upon their conversation with the first in- 
stalment of quails, which a few minutes had sufficed 
to cook. 

*'What a delicious bird a quail is,*' said Hanky. 

"Landrail, Hanky, landrail," said the other re- 
proachfully. 

Having finished the first birds in a very few minutes 
they returned to the statues. 

"Old Mrs. Nosnibor," said Panky, "says the Sun- 
child told her they were symbolic of ten tribes who had 
incurred the displeasure of the sun, his father." 

I make no comment on my father's feelings. 

"Of the sun! his fiddlesticks' ends," retorted Hanky. 
"He never called the sun his father. Besides, from all 
I have heard about him, I take it he was a precious 
idiot." 

"O Hanky, Hanky! you will wreck the whole thing 
if you ever allow yourself to talk in that way." 

"You are more likely to wreck it yourself, Panky, by 
never doing so. People like being deceived, but they 
like also to have an inkling of their own deception, and 
you never inkle them." 

"The Queen," said Panky, returning to the statues, 
"sticks to it that . . ." 

"Here comes another bird," interrupted Hanky; 
"never mind about the Queen." 



38 Erewhon Revisited 

The bird was soon eaten, whereon Panky again took 
up his parable about the Queen. 

"The Queen says they are connected with the cult 
of the ancient Goddess Kiss-me-quick." 

"What if they are? But the Queen sees Kiss-me- 
quick in everything. Another quail, if you please, Mr. 
Ranger." 

My father brought up another bird almost directly. 
Silence while it was being eaten. 

"Talking of the Sunchild," said Panky; "did you 
ever see him?" 

"Never set eyes on him, and hope I never shall." 

And so on till the last bird was eaten. 

"Fellow," said Panky, "fetch some more wood; the 
fire is nearly dead." 

"I can find no more, sir," said my father, who was 
afraid lest some genuine ranger might be attracted by 
the light, and was determined to let it go out as soon 
as he had done cooking. 

"Never mind," said Hanky, "the moon will be up 
soon." 

"And now. Hanky," said Panky, "tell me what you 
propose to say on Sunday. I suppose you have pretty 
well made up your mind about it by this time." 

"Pretty nearly. I shall keep it much on the usual 
lines. I shall dwell upon the benighted state from 
which the Sunchild rescued us, and shall show how the 
Musical Banks, by at once taking up the movement, 
have been the blessed means of its now almost uni- 
versal success. I shall talk about the immortal glory 
shed upon Sunch'ston by the Sunchild's residence in 
the prison, and wind up with the Sunchild Evidence 
Society, and an earnest appeal for funds to endow the 



The Professors Converse 39 

canonries required for the due service of the temple. 

"Temple! What temple?" groaned my father in- 
wardly. 

'*And what are you going to do about the four black 
and white horses ?'' 

"Stick to them, of course — unless I make them six." 

"I really do not see why they might not have been 
horses." 

"I dare say you do not/' returned the other drily, 
**but they were black and white storks, and you know 
that as well as I do. Still, they have caught on, and 
they are in the altar-piece, prancing and curvetting 
magnificently, so I shall trot them out." 

"Altar-piece ! Altar-piece !" again groaned my father 
inwardly. 

He need not have groaned, for when he came to see 
the so-called altar-piece he found that the table above 
which it was placed had nothing in common with 
the altar in a Christian church. It was a mere table, 
on which were placed two bowls full, of Musical Bank 
coins; two cashiers, who sat on either side of it, dis- 
pensed a few of these to all comers, while there was a 
box in front of it wherein people deposited coin of the 
realm according to their will or ability. The idea of 
sacrifice was not contemplated, and the position of the 
table, as well as the name given to it, was an instance of 
the way in which the Erewhonians had caught names 
and practices from my father, without understanding 
what they either were or meant. So, again, when 
Professor Hanky had spoken of canonries, he had 
none but the vaguest idea of w^hat a canonry is. 

I may add further that as a boy my father had had 
his Bible well drilled into him, and never forgot it. 



40 Erewhon Revisited 

Hence biblical passages and expressions had been often 
in his mouth, as the effect of mere unconscious cere- 
bration. The Erewhonians had caught many of these, 
sometimes corrupting them so that they were hardly 
recognizable. Things that he remembered having said 
were continually meeting him during the few days of 
his second visit, and it shocked him deeply to meet some 
gross travesty of his own words, or of words more 
sacred than his own, and yet to be unable to correct it. 
*T wonder," he said to me, "that no one has ever hit 
on this as a punishment for the damned in_ Hades." 

Let me now return to Professor Hanky, whom I 
fear that I have left too long. 

"And of course," he continued, "I shall say all 
sorts of pretty things about the Mayoress — for I sup- 
pose we must not even think of her as Yram now." 

"The Mayoress," replied Panky, "is a very danger- 
ous woman; see how she stood out about the way in 
which the Sunchild had worn his clothes before they 
gave him the then Erewhonian dress. Besides, she is a 
sceptic at heart, and so is that precious son of hers." 

"She was quite right," said Hanky, with something 
of a snort. "She brought him his dinner while he was 
still wearing the clothes he came in, and if men do not 
notice how a man wears his clothes, women do. Be- 
sides, there are many living who saw him wear them." 

"Perhaps," said Panky, "but we should never have 
talked the King over if we had not humoured him on 
this point. Yram nearly wrecked us by her obstinacy. 
If we had not frightened her, and if your study, 
Hanky, had not happened to have been burned . . ." 

"Come, come, Panky, no more of that." 

"Of course I do not doubt that it was an accident; 



The Professors Converse 41 

nevertheless, if your study had not been accidentally 
burned, on the very night the clothes were entrusted 
to you for earnest, patient, careful, scientific investi- 
gation — and Yram very nearly burned too — we should 
never have carried it through. See what work we 
had to get the King to allow the way in which the 
clothes were worn to be a matter of opinion, not dogma. 
What a pity is it that the clothes were not burned be- 
fore the King's tailor had copied them." 

Hanky laughed heartily enough. *'Yes," he said, 
"it was touch and go. Why, I wonder, could not the 
Queen have put the clothes on a dummy that would 
show back from front ? As soon as it was brought into 
the council chamber the King jumped to a conclusion, 
and we had to bundle both dummy and Yram out of 
the royal presence, for neither she nor the King would 
budge an inch." 

Even Panky smiled. "What could we do? The 
common people almost worship Yram ; and so does her 
husband, though her fair-haired eldest son was born 
barely seven months after marriage. The people in 
these parts like to think that the Sunchild's blood' is in 
the country, and yet they swear through thick and 
think that he is the Mayor's duly begotten offspring — 
Faugh ! Do you think they would have stood his being 
jobbed into the rangership by any one else but Yram?" 

My father's feelings may be imagined, but I will not 
here interrupt the Professors. 

"Well, well," said Hanky ; "for men must rob and 
women must job so long as the world goes on. I did 
the best I could. The King would never have embraced 
Sunchildism if I had not told him he was right; then, 
when satisfied that we agreed with him, he yielded to 



42 Erewhon Revisited 

popular prejudice and allowed the question to remain 
open. One of his Royal Professors was to wear the 
clothes one way, and the other the other/' 

"My way of wearing them," said Panky, "is much 
the most convenient." 

"Not a bit of it," said Hanky warmly. On this the 
two Professors fell out, and the discussion grew so hot 
that my father interfered by advising them not to 
talk so loud lest another ranger should hear them. "You 
know,'' he said, "there are a good many landrail bones 
lying about, and it might be awkward." 

The Professors hushed at once. "By the way," said 
Panky, after a pause, "it is very strange about those 
footprints in the snow. The man had evidently walked 
round the statues two or three times as though they 
were strange to him, and he had certainly come from 
the other side." 

"It was one of the rangers," said Hanky impa- 
tiently, "who had gone a little beyond the statues, and 
come back again." 

"Then we should have seen his footprints as he went. 
I am glad I measured them." 

"There is nothing in it ; but what were your meas- 
urements?" 

"Eleven inches by four and a half ; nails on the soles ; 
one nail missing on the right foot and two on the left." 
Then, turning to my father quickly, he said "My man, 
allow me to have a look at your boots." 

"Nonsense, Panky, nonsense!" 

Now my father by this time was wondering whether 
he should not set upon these two men, kill them if he 
could, and make the best of his way back, but he had 
still a card to play. 



The Professors Converse 43 

"Certainly, sir/' said he, ''but I should tell you that 
they are not my boots." 

He took off his right boot and handed it to Panky. 

"Exactly so! Eleven inches by four and a half and 
one nail missing. And now, Mr. Ranger, will you 
be good enough to explain how you became possessed 
of that boot. You need not show me the other." And 
he spoke like an examiner who was confident that he 
could floor his examinee in znvd voce. 

"You know our orders," answered my father, "you 
have seen them on your permit. I met one of those 
foreign devils from the other side, of whom we have 
bad more than one lately; he came from out of the 
clouds that hang higher up, and as he had no permit 
and could not speak a word of our language, I gripped 
him, flung him, and strangled him. Thus far I was 
only obeying orders, but seeing how much better his 
boots were than mine, and finding that they would fit 
me, I resolved to keep them. You may be sure I should 
not have done so if I had known there was snow on the 
top of the pass." 
^ "He could not invent that," said Hanky; "it is plain 
that he has not been up to the statues." 

Panky was staggered. "And of course," said he 
ironically, "you took nothing from this poor wretch 
except his boots." 

"Sir," said my father, "I will make a clean breast 
of everything. I flung his body, his clothes, and my old 
boots into the pool ; but I kept his blankets, some things 
he used for cooking and some strange stuff that looks 
like dried leaves, as well as a small bag of something 
which I believe is gold. I thought I could sell the lot 



44 Erewhon Revisited 

to some dealer in curiosities who would ask no ques- 
tions." 

*'And what, pray, have you done with all these 
things?" 

'They are here, sir.'* And as he spoke he dived 
into the wood, returning with the blanket, billy, panni- 
kin, tea and the little bag of nuggets which he had 
kept accessible. 

"This is very strange" said Hanky, who was begin- 
ning to be afraid of my father when he learned that 
he sometimes killed people. 

Here the Professors talked hurriedly to one another 
in a tongue which my father could not understand, but 
which he felt sure was the hypothetical language of 
which he has spoken in his book. 

Presently Hanky said to my father quite civilly, 
"And what, my good man, do you propose to do with 
all these things? I should tell you at once that what 
you take to be gold is nothing of the kind ; it is a base 
metal, hardly, if at all, worth more than copper." 

"I have had enough of them ; to-morrow morning I 
shall take them with me to the Blue Pool, and drop 
them into it." 

"It is a pity you should do that," said Hanky mu- 
singly : "the things are interesting as curiosities, and — 
and — and — what will you take for them?" 

"I could not do it, sir," answered my father. "I 

would not do it, no, not for " and he named a sum 

equivalent to about five pounds of our money. For he 
wanted Erewhonian money, and thought it worth his 
while to sacrifice his ten pounds' worth of nuggets in 
order to get a supply of current coin. 

Hanky tried to beat him down, assuring him that no 



The Professors Converse 45 

curiosity dealer would give half as much, and my father 
so far yielded as to take £4, los. in silver, which, as I 
have already explained, would not be worth more than 
half a sovereign in gold. At this figure a bargain was 
struck, and the Professors paid up without offering him 
a single Musical Bank coin. They wanted to include 
the boots in the purchase, but here my father stood out. 

But he could not stand out as regards another matter, 
which caused him some anxiety. Panky insisted that 
my father should give them a receipt for the money, 
and there was an altercation between the Professors 
on this point, much longer than I can here find space to 
give. Hanky argued that a receipt was useless, inas- 
much as it would be ruin to my father ever to refer 
to the subject again. Panky, however, was anxious, 
not lest my father should again claim the money, but 
(though he did not say so outright) lest Hanky should 
claim the whole purchase as his own. In the end 
Panky, for a wonder, carried the day, and a receipt was 
drawn up to the effect that the undersigned acknowl- 
edged to have received from Professors Hanky and 
Panky the sum of £4, los. (I translate the amount), as 
joint purchasers of certain pieces of yellow ore, a blan- 
ket, and sundry articles found without an owner in 
the King's preserves. This paper was dated, as the 
permit had been, XIX. xii. 29. 

My father, generally so ready, was at his wits' end 
for a name, and could think of none but Mr. Nosni- 
bor's. Happily, remembering that this gentleman had 
also been called Senoj — a name common enough in 
Erewhon — he signed himself, ''Senoj, Under-ranger." 

Panky was now satisfied. "We will put it in the 
bag," he said, "with the pieces of yellow ore." 



46 Erewhon Revisited 

"Put it where you like," said Hanky contemptu- 
ously; and into the bag it was put. 

When all was now concluded, my father laughingly 
said, *'If you have dealt unfairly by me, I forgive you. 
My motto is, Torgive us our trespasses, as we forgive 
them that trespass against us.' " 

''Repeat those last words," said Panky eagerly. My 
father was alarmed at his manner, but thought it safer 
to repeat them. 

''You hear that, Hanky? I am convinced; I have 
not another word to say. The man is a true Ere- 
whonian; he has our corrupt reading of the Sunchild's 
prayer." 

* 'Please explain." 

"Why, can you not see?" said Panky, who was by 
way of being great at conjectural emendations. "Can 
you not see how impossible it is that the Sunchild, or 
any of the people to whom he declared (as we now 
know provisionally) that he belonged, could have made 
the forgiveness of his own sins depend on the readiness 
with which he forgave other people? No man in his 
senses would dream of such a thing. It would be 
asking a supposed all-powerful being not to forgive his 
sins at all, or at best to forgive them imperfectly. No ; 
Yram got it wrong. She mistook 'but do not' for 'as 
we.' The sound of the words is very much alike; the 
correct reading should obviously be, 'Forgive us our 
trespasses, but do not forgive them that trespass against 
us.' This makes sense, and turns an impossible prayer 
into one that goes straight to the heart of every one of 
us." Then, turning to my father, he said, "You can 
see this, my man, can you not, as soon as it is pointed 
out to you ?" 



The Professors Converse 47 

My father said that he saw it now, but had always 
heard the words as he had himself spoken them. 

*'0f course you have, my good fellow, and it is be- 
cause of this that I know they never can have reached 
you except from an Erewhonian source/' 

Hanky smiled, snorted, and muttered in an under- 
tone, "I shall begin to think that this fellow is a foreign 
devil after all." 

"And now, gentlemen," said my father, "the Won is 
risen. I must be after the quails at daybreak; I will 
therefore go to the rangers' shelter" (a shelter, by the 
way, which existed only in my father's invention), 
"and get a couple of hours' sleep so as to be both close 
to the quail-ground and fresh for running. You are 
so near the boundary of the preserves that you will not 
want your permit further; no one will meet you and 
should any one do so you need only give your names 
and say that you have made a mistake. You will have 
to give it up to-morrow at the Ranger's office; jt will 
save you trouble if I collect it now and give it up when 
I deliver my quails. 

/'As regards the curiosities, hide them as you best can 
outside the limits. I recommend you to carry them at 
once out of the forest and rest beyond the limits rather 
than here. You can then recover them whenever and 
in whatever way you may find convenient. But I hope 
you will say nothing about any foreign devil's having 
come over on to this side. Any whisper to this effect 
unsettles people's minds, and they are too much unset- 
tled already; hence our orders to kill any one from 
over there at once and to tell no one but the Head 
Ranger. I was forced by you, gentlemen, to disobey 
these orders in self-defence; I must trust your gener- 



48 Erewhon Revisited 

osity to keep what I have told you secret. I shall of 
course report it to the Head Ranger. And now if you 
think proper you can give me up your permit/' 

All this was so plausible that the Professors gave 
up their permit without a word but thanks. They 
bundled their curiosities hurriedly into "the poor 
foreign devil's" blanket, reserving a more careful pack- 
ing till they were out of the preserves. They wished 
my father a very good night, and all success with his 
quails in the morning ; they thanked him again for the 
care he had taken of them in the matter of the land- 
rails, and Panky even wxnt so far as to give him a few 
Musical Bank coins, which he gratefully accepted. 
They then started off in the direction of Sunch'ston. 

My father gathered up the remaining quails, some 
of which he meant to eat in the morning, while the 
others he would throw away as soon as he could find a 
safe place. He turned towards the mountains, but be- 
fore he had gone a dozen yards he heard a voice, which 
he recognized as Panky's, shouting after him, and say- 
ing— 

"Mind you do not forget the true reading of the 
Sunchild's prayer." 

"You are an old fool," shouted my father in English, 
knowing that he could hardly be heard, still less under- 
stood, and thankful to relieve his feelings. 



CHAPTER V 

MY FATHER MEETS A SON^ OF WHOSE EXISTENCE HE 
WAS IGNORANT, AND STRIKES A BARGAIN WITH 
HIM. 

The incidents recorded in the last two chapters had 
occupied about two hours, so that it was nearly mid- 
night before my father could begin to retrace his steps 
and make towards the camp that he had left that morn- 
ing. This was necessary, for he could not go any fur- 
ther in a costume that he now knev/ to be forbidden. 
At this hour no ranger was likely to meet him before 
he reached the statues, and by making a push for it he 
could return in time to cross the limits of the preserves 
before the Professors' permit had expired. If chal- 
lenged, he must brazen it out that he was one or other 
of the persons therein named. 

'Fatigued though he was, he reached the statues, as 
near as he could guess, at about three in the morning. 
What little wind there had been was warm, so that 
the tracks, which the Professors must have seen shortly 
after he had made them, had disappeared. The statues 
looked very weird in the moonlight, but they were not 
chanting. 

While ascending he pieced together the information 
he had picked up from the Professors. Plainly, the 
Sunchild, or child of the sun, was none other than 
himself, and the new name of Coldharbour was doubt- 

49 



50 Erewhon Revisited 

less intended to commemorate the fact that this was 
the first town he had reached in Erewhon. Plainly, 
also, he was supposed to be of superhuman origin — 
his flight in the balloon having been not unnaturally be- 
lieved to be miraculous. The Erewhonians had for 
centuries been effacing all knowledge of their former 
culture ; archaeologists, indeed, could still glean a little 
from museums, and from volumes hard to come by, and 
still harder to understand ; but archaeologists were few, 
and even though they had made researches (which they 
may or may not have done), their labours had never 
reached the masses. What wonder, then, that the 
mushroom spawn of myth, ever present in an atmos- 
phere highly charged with ignorance, had germinated 
in a soil so favourably prepared for its reception? 

He saw it all now. It was twenty years next Sunday 
since he and my mother had eloped. That was the 
meaning of XIX. xii. 29. They had made a new era, 
dating from the day of his return to the palace of the 
sun with a bride who was doubtless to unite the Ere- 
whonian nature with that of the sun. The New Year, 
then, would date from Sunday, December 7 which 
would therefore become XX. i. i. The Thursday, now 
nearly if not quite over, being only two days distant 
from the end of a month of thirty-one days, which 
was also the last of the year, would be XIX. xii. 29, as 
on the Professors' permit. 

I should like to explain here what will appear more 
clearly on a later page^ — I mean, that the Erewhonians, 
according to their new system, do not believe the sun to 
be a god except as regards this world and his other 
planets. My father had told them a little about astron- 
omy, and had assured them that all the fixed stars were 



Father and Son 51 

suns like our own, with planets revolving round them, 
which were probably tenanted by intelligent living be- 
ings, however unlike they might be to ourselves. From 
this they evolved the theory that the sun was the ruler 
of this platentary system, and that he must be personi- 
fied, as they personified the air-god, the gods of time 
and space, hope, justice, and the other deities mentioned 
in my father's book. They retain their old belief in the 
actual existence of these gods but they now make them 
all subordinate to the sun. The nearest approach they 
make to our own conception of God is to say that He 
is the ruler over all the suns throughout the universe — 
tlie suns being to Him much as our planets and their 
denizens are to our own sun. They deny that He takes 
more interest in one sun and its system than in another. 
All the suns with their attendant planets are supposed 
to be equally His children, and He deputes to each sun 
the supervision and protection of its own system. 
Hence they say that though we may pray to the air- 
god, &c., and even to the sun, we must not pray to God. 
We may be thankful to Him for watching over the 
suns, but we must not go further. 

Going back to my father's reflections, he perceived 
that the Erewhonians had not only adopted our calen- 
dar, as he had repeatedly explained it to the Nosnibors, 
but had taken our week as well, and were making Sun- 
day a high day, just as we do. Next Sunday, in com- 
memoration of the twentieth year after his ascent, they 
were about to dedicate a temple to him ; in this there 
was to be a picture showing himself and his earthly 
bride on their heavenward journey, in a chariot drawn 
by four black and white horses — which, however, Pro- 



52 Erewhon Revisited 

fessor Hanky had positively affirmed to have been only 
storks. 

Here I interrupted my father . **But were there," I 
said, "any storks ?" 

**Yes," he answered. "As soon as I heard Hanky's 
words I remembered that a flight of some four or five 
of the large storks so common in Erewhon during the 
summer months had been wheeling high aloft in one of 
those aerial dances that so much delight them. I had 
quite forgotten it, but it came back to me at once that 
these creatures, attracted doubtless by what they took to 
be an unknown kind of bird, swooped down towards 
the balloon and circled round it like so many satellites 
to a heavenly body. I was fearful lest they should 
strike at it with their long and formidable beaks, in 
which case all would have been soon over ; either they 
were afraid, or they had satisfied their curiosity — at 
any rate, they let us alone ; but they kept with us till we 
were well away from the capital. Strange, how com- 
pletely this incident had escaped me." 

I return to my father's thoughts as he made his way 
back to his old camp. 

As for the reversed position of Professor Panky's 
clothes, he remembered having given his own old ones 
to the Queen, and having thought that she might have 
got a better dummy on which to display them than the 
headless scarecrow, which, however, he supposed was 
all her ladies-in-waiting could lay their hands on at the 
moment. If that dummy had never been replaced, it 
was perhaps not very strange that the King could not 
at the first glance tell back from front, and if he did 
not guess right at first, there was little chance of his 



Father and Son 53 

changing, for his first ideas were apt to be his last. But 
he must find out more about this. 

Then how about the watch? Had their views about 
machinery also changed? Or was there an exception 
made about any machine that he had himself carried? 

Yram too. She must have been married not long 
after she and he had parted. So she was now wife to 
the Mayor, and was evidently able to have things pretty 
much her own way in Sunch'ston, as he supposed he 
must now call it. Thank heaven she was prosperous ! 
It was interesting to know that she was at heart a 
sceptic, as was also her light-haired son, now Head 
Ranger. And that son? Just twenty years of age! 
Born seven months after marriage ! Then the Mayor 
doubtless had light hair too; but why did not those 
wretches say in which month Yram was married? If 
she had married soon after he had left, this was why 
he had not been sent for or written to. Pray heaven it 
was so. As for current gossip, people would talk, and 
if the lad was well begotten, what could it matter to 
them whose son he was ? *'But," thought my father, "I 
am glad I did not meet him on my way down. I had 
rather have been killed by some one else." 

Hanky and Panky again. He remembered Bridge- 
ford as the town where the Colleges of Unreason had 
been most rife; he had visited it, but he had forgotten 
that it was called "The city of the people who are above 
suspicion." Its Professors were evidently going to 
muster in great force on Sunday; if two of them had 
robbed him, he could forgive them, for the information 
he had gleaned from them had furnished him with a 
pied a terre. Moreover, he had got as much Erewhon- 
ian money as he should want, for he had resolved to re- 



54 Erewhon Revisited 

trace his steps immediately after seeing the temple dedi- 
cated to himself. He knew the danger he should run 
in returning over the preserves v^ithout a permit, but 
his curiosity was so great that he resolved to risk it. 

Soon after he had passed the statues he began to 
descend, and it being now broad day, he did so by 
leaps and bounds, for the ground was not precipitous. 
He reached his old camp soon after five — this, at any 
rate, was the hour at which he set his watch on finding 
that it had run down during his absence. There was 
now no reason why he should not take it with him, so 
he put it in his pocket. The parrots had attacked his 
saddle-bags, saddle, and bridle, as they were sure to do, 
but they had not got inside the bags. He took out his 
English clothes and put them on — stowing his bags of 
gold in various pockets, but keeping his Erewhonian 
money in the one that was most accessible. He put his 
Erewhonian dress back into the saddle-bags, intending 
to keep it as a curiosity; he also refreshed the dye upon 
his hands, face, and hair; he lit himself a fire, made 
tea, cooked and ate two brace of quails, which he had 
plucked while walking so as to save time, and then flung 
himself on to the ground to snatch an hour's very neces- 
sary rest. When he awoke he found he had slept two 
hours, not one, which was perhaps as well, and by eight 
he began to reascend the pass. 

He reached the statues about noon, for he allowed 
himself not a moment's rest. This time there was a 
stifiish wind, and they were chanting lustily. He 
passed them with all speed, and had nearly reached the 
place where he had caught the quails, when he saw a 
man in a dress which he guessed at once to be a ran- 
ger's, but which, strangely enough, seeing that he was 



Father and Son 55 

in the Kng's employ, was not reversed. My father's 
heart beat fast ; he got out his permit and held it open 
in his hand, then with a smiling face he went towards 
the Ranger, who was standing his ground. 

"I believe you are the Head Ranger," said my father, 
who saw that he was still smooth-faced and had light 
hair. "I am Professor Panky, and here is my permit. 
My brother Professor has been prevented from com- 
ing with me, and, as you see, I am alone." 

My father had professed to pass himself off as 
Panky, for he had rather gathered that Hanky was the 
better known man of the two. 

While the youth was scrutinising the permit, evi- 
dently with suspicion, my father took stock of him, and 
saw his own past self in him too plainly — knowing all 
he knew — to doubt whose son he was. He had the 
greatest difficulty in hiding his emotion, for the lad was 
indeed one of whom any father might be proud. He 
longed to be able to embrace him and claim him for 
what he was, but this, as he well knew, might not be. 
The tears again welled into his eyes when he told me 
of the struggle with himself that he had then had. 

"Don't be jealous, my dearest boy," he said to me. 
"I love you quite as dearly as I love him, or better, but 
he was sprung upon me so suddenly, and dazzled me 
with his comely debonair face, so full of youth, and 
health, and frankness. Did you see him, he would go 
straight to your heart, for he is wonderfully like you in 
spite of your taking so much after your poor mother." 

I was not jealous ; on the contrary, I longed to see 
this youth, and find in him such a brother as I had often 
wished to have. But let me return to my father's story. 

The young man, after examining the permit, de- 



56 Erewhon Revisited 

clared it to be in form, and returned it to my father, but 
he eyed him with poHte disfavour. 

"I suppose," he said, ''you have come up, as so many 
are doing, from Bridgeford and all over the country, to 
the dedication on Sunday." 

''Yes," said my father. "Bless me!" he added, 
"what a wind you have up here ! How it makes one's 
eyes water, to be sure" ; But he spoke with a cluck in 
his throat which no wind that blows can cause. 

"Have you met any suspicious characters between 
here and the statues ?" asked the youth. "I came across 
the ashes of a fire lower down; there had been three 
men sitting for some time round it, and they had all 
been eating quails. Here are some of the bones and 
feathers, which I shall keep. They had not been gone 
more than a couple of hours, for the ashes were still 
warm ; they are getting bolder and bolder — who would 
have thought they would dare to light a fire? I sup- 
pose you have not met any one; but if you have seen a 
single person, let me know." 

My father said quite truly that he had met no one. 
He then laughingly asked how the youth had been able 
to discover as much as he had. 

"There were three well-marked forms, and three 
separate lots of quail bones hidden in the ashes. One 
man had done all the plucking. This is strange, but I 
dare say I shall get at it later." 

After a little further conversation the Ranger said 
he was now going down to Sunch'ston, and, though 
somewhat curtly, proposed that he and my father 
should walk together. 

"By all means," answered my father. 

Before they had gone more than a few hundred yards 



Father and Son 57 

his companion said, "If you will come with me a little 
to the left, I can show you the Blue Pool." 

To avoid the precipitous ground over which the 
stream here fell, they had diverged to the right, where 
they had found a smoother descentj returning now to 
the stream, which was about to enter on a level stretch 
for some distance, they found themselves on the brink 
of a rocky basin, of no great size, but very blue, and 
evidently deep. 

'This," said the Ranger, "is where our orders tell us 
to fling any foreign devil who comes over from the 
other side. I have only been Head Ranger about nine 
months, and have not yet had to face this horrid duty ; 
but," and here he smiled, "when I first caught sight 
of you I thought I should have to make a beginning. I 
was very glad when I saw you had a permit." 

"And how many skeletons do you suppose are lying 
at the bottom of this pool?" 

"I believe not more than seven or eight in all. There 
were three or four about eighteen years ago, and about 
the same number of late years ; one man was flung here 
only about three months before I was appointed. I 
have the full list, with dates, down in my oflice, but 
the rangers never let people in Sunch'ston know when 
they have Blue-Pooled any one; it would unsettle 
men's minds, and some of them would be coming up 
here in the dark to drag the pool, and see whether they 
could find anything on the body." 

My father was glad to turn away from this most re- 
pulsive place. After a time he said, "And what do you 
good people hereabouts think of next Sunday's grand 
doings?" 

Bearing in mind what he had gleaned from the Pro- 



58 Erewhon Revisited 

fessors about the Ranger's opinions, my father gave a 
sHghtly ironical turn to his pronunciation of the words 
"grand doings." The youth glanced at him with a 
quick penetrative look, and laughed as he said, "The 
doings will be grand enough." 

"What a fine temple they have built," said my father. 
"I have not yet seen the picture, but they say the four 
black and white horses are magnificently painted. I 
saw the Sunchild ascend, but I saw no horses in the sky, 
nor anything like horses." 

The youth was much interested. "Did you really see 
him ascend ?" he asked ; "and what, pray, do you think 
it all was?" 

"Whatever it was, there were no horses." 

"But there must have been, for, as you of course 
know, they have lately found some droppings from one 
of them, which have been miraculously preserved, and 
they are going to show them next Sunday in a gold 
reliquary." 

*T know," said my father, who, however, was learn- 
ing the fact for the first time. "I have not yet seen this 
precious relic, but I think they might have found some- 
thing less unpleasant." 

"Perhaps they would if they could," replied the 
youth, laughing, "but there was nothing else that the 
horses could leave. It is only a number of curiously 
rounded stones, and not at all like what they say it is.*' 

"Well, well," continued my father, "but relic or no 
relic, there are many who, while they fully recognise 
the value of the Sunchild's teaching, dislike these cock 
and bull stories as blasphemy against God's most 
blessed gift of reason. There are many in Bridgeford 
who hate this story of the horses." 



Father and Son 59 

The youth was now quite reassured. '*So there are 
here, sir," he said warmly, ''and who hate the Sunchild 
too. If there is such a hell as he used to talk about to 
my mother, we doubt not but that he will be cast into 
its deepest fires. See how he has turned us all upside 
down. But we dare not say what we think. There is 
no courage left in Erewhon." 

Then waxing calmer he said, "It is you Bridgeford 
people and your Musical Banks that have done it all. 
The Musical Bank Managers saw that the people were 
falling away from them. Finding that the vulgar be- 
lieved this foreign devil Higgs — for he gave this name 

to my mother when he was in prison — finding that 

But you know all this as well as I do. How can you 
Bridgeford Professors pretend to believe about these 
horses, and about the Sunchild's being son to the sun, 
when all the time you know tliere is no truth in it?" 

*'My son — for considering the difference in our ages 
I may be allowed to call you so — we at Bridgeford are 
much like you at Sunch'ston ; we dare not always say 
what we think. Nor would it be wise to do so, when we 
should not be listened to. This fire must burn itself 
out, for it has got such hold that nothing can either stay 
or turn it. Even though Higgs himself were to return 
and tell it from the house-tops that he was a mortal — 
ay, and a very common one — he would be killed, but 
not believed." 

"Let him come; let him show himself, speak out and 
die, if the people choose to kill him. In that case I 
would forgive him, accept him for my father, as silly 
people sometimes say he is, and honour him to my 
dying day." 

"Would that be a bargain?" said my father, smiling 



6o Erewhon Revisited 

in spite of emotion so strong that he could hardly bring 
the words out of his mouth. 

"Yes, it would," said the youth doggedly. 

'Then let me shake hands with you on his behalf, 
and let us change the conversation." 

He took my father's hand, doubtfully and somewhat 
disdainfully, but he did not refuse it. 



CHAPTER VI 

FURTHER CONVERSATION BETWEEN FATHER AND 



It is one thing to desire a conversation to be changed, 
and another to change it. After some Httle silence my 
father said, ''And may I ask what name your mother 
gave you?'^ 

"My name," he answered, laughing, "is George and 
I wish it were some other, for it is the first name of 
that arch-impostor Higgs. I hate it as I hate the man 
who owned it." 

My father said nothing but he hid his face in his 
hands. 

"Sir," said the other, "I fear you are in some dis- 
tress." 

^ "You remind me," replied my father, "of a son who 
was stolen from me when he was a child. I searched 
for him during many years, and at last fell in with him 
by accident, to find him all the heart of father could 
wish. But alas ! he did not take kindly to me as I to 
him, and after two days he left me; nor shall I ever 
again see him." 

"Then, sir, had I not better leave you?" 

"No, stay with me till your road takes you else- 
where ; for though I cannot see my son, you are so like 
him that I could almost fancy he is with me. And 
now — for I shall show no more weakness — you say 

6i 



62 Erewhon Revisited 

your mother knew the Sunchild, as I am used to call 
him. Tell me what kind of a man she found him." 

*'She liked him well enough in spite of his being a 
little silly. She does not believe he ever called himself 
child of the sun. He used to say he had a father in 
heaven to whom he prayed, and who could hear him ; 
but he said that all of us, my mother as much as he, 
have this unseen father. My mother does not believe 
he meant doing us any harm, but only that he wanted 
to get himself and Mrs. Nosnibor's younger daughter 
out of the country. As for there having been anything 
supernatural about the balloon, she will have none of 
it; she says that it was some machine which he knew 
how to make, but which we have lost the art of making, 
as we have of many another. 

'This is what she says amongst ourselves, but in 
public she confirms all that the Musical Bank Managers 
say about him. She is afraid of them. You know, per- 
haps, that Professor Hanky, whose name I see on your 
permit, tried to burn her alive?" 

*'Thank heaven!" thought my father, "that I am 
Panky;" but aloud he said, "Oh, horrible! horrible! I 
cannot believe this even of Hanky." 

"He denies it, and we say we believe him; he was 
most kind and attentive to my mother during all the 
rest of her stay in Bridgeford. He and she parted ex- 
cellent friends, but I know what she thinks. I shall be 
sure to see him while he is in Sunch'ston, I shall have 
to be civil to him but it makes me sick to think of it." 

"When shall you see him?" said my father, who was 
alarmed at learning that Hanky and the Ranger were 
likely to meet. Who could tell but that he might see 
Panky too ? 



Father and Son Part 63 

"I have been away from home a fortnight, and shall 
shall not be back till late on Saturday night. I do not 
suppose I shall see him before Sunday." 

*That will do," thought my father, who at that mo- 
ment deemed that nothing would matter to him much 
when Sunday was over. Then, turning to the Ranger, 
he said, "I gather, then, that your mother does not think 
so badly of the Sunchild after all?" 

'^She laughs at him sometimes, but if any of us boys 
and girls say a word against him we get snapped up 
directly. My mother turns every one round her fin- 
ger. Her word is law in Sunch'ston ; every one obeys 
her; she has faced more than one mob, and quelled 
them when my father could not do so." 

*'I can believe all you say of her. What other chil- 
dren has she besides yourself?" 

"We are four sons, of whom the youngest is now 
fourteen, and three daughters." 

"May all health and happiness attend her and you, 
and all of you, henceforth and forever," and my father 
involuntarily bared his head as he spoke. 

"Sir," said the youth, impressed by the fervency of 
my father's manner, "I thank you, but you do not talk 
as Bridgeford Professors generally do, so far as I have 
seen or heard them. Why do you wish us all well so 
very heartily ? Is it because you think I am like your 
son, or is there some other reason?" 

"It is not my son alone that you resemble," said my 
father tremulously, for he knew he was going too far. 
He carried it by adding, "You resemble all who love 
truth and hate lies, as I do." 

"Then, sir," said the youth gravely, "you much belie 
your reputation. And now I must leave you for an- 



64 Erewhon Revisited 

other part of the preserves, where I think it Hkely that 
last night's poachers may now be, and where I shall 
pass the night in watching for them. You may want 
your permit for a few miles further, so I will not take 
it. Neither need you give it up at Sunch'ston. It is 
dated, and will be useless after this evening." 

With this he strode off into the forest, bowing po- 
litely but somewhat coldly, and without encouraging 
my father's half proffered hand. 

My father turned sad and unsatisfied away. 

"It serves me right," he said to himself ; ''he ought 
never to have been my son ; and yet, if such men can 
be brought by hook or by crook into the world, surely 
the world should not ask questions about the bringing. 
How cheerless everything looks now that he has left 



By this time it was three o'clock, and in another few 
minutes my father came upon the ashes of the fire be- 
side which he and the Professors had supped on the 
preceding evening. It was only some eighteen hours 
since they had come upon him, and yet what an age it 
seemed! It was well the Ranger had left him, for 
though my father, of course, would have known noth- 
ing about either fire or poachers, it might have led to 
further falsehood, and by this time he had become ex- 
hausted — not to say, for the time being, sick of lies 
altogether. 

He trudged slowly on, without meeting a soul, until 
he came upon some stones that evidently marked the 
limits of the preserves. When he had got a mile or so 
beyond these, he struck a narrow and not much fre- 
quented path, which he was sure would lead him 



The Professors' Hoard 65 

towards Sunch'ston, and soon afterwards, seeing a 
huge old chestnut tree some thirty or forty yards from 
the path itself, he made towards it and flung himself on 
the ground beneath its branches. There were abundant 
signs that he was nearing farm lands and homesteads, 
but there was no one about, and if any one saw him 
there was nothing in his appearance to arouse suspicion. 

He determined, therefore, to rest here till hunger 
should wake him, and drive him into Sunch'ston, 
which, however, he did not wish to reach till dusk if he 
could help it. He meant to buy a valise and a few 
toilette necessaries before the shops should close, and 
then engage a bedroom at the least frequented inn he 
could find that looked fairly clean and comfortable. 

He slept till nearly six, and on waking gathered his 
thoughts together. He could not shake his newly 
found son from out of them, but there was no good in 
dwelling upon him now, and he turned his thoughts to 
the Professors. How, he wondered, were they getting 
on, and what had they done with the things they had 
bought from him ? 

''How delightful it would be,'* he said to himself, "if 
I ^ could find where they have hidden their hoard, and 
hide it somewhere else.*' 

He tried to project his mind into those of the Pro- 
fessors, as though they were a team of straying bullocks 
whose probable action he must determine before he set 
out to look for them. 

On reflection, he concluded that the hidden property 
was not likely to be far from the spot on which he now 
was. The Professors would wait till they had got 
some way down towards Sunch'ston, so as to have 
readier access to their property when they wanted to 



66 Erewhon Revisited 

remove it ; but when they came upon a path and other 
signs that' inhabited dwelHngs could not be far distant, 
they would begin to look out for a hiding-place. And 
they would take pretty well the first that came. "Why, 
bless my heart," he exclaimed, ''this tree is hollow; I 

wonder whether " and on looking up he saw an 

innocent little strip of the very tough fibrous leaf com- 
monly used while green as string, or even rope, by the 
Erewhonians. The plant that makes this leaf is so like 
the ubiquitous New Zealand Phorniium tena^, or flax, 
as it is there called, that I shall speak of it as flax in 
future, as indeed I have already done without explana- 
tion on an earlier page; for this plant grows on both 
sides of the great range. The piece of flax, then, which 
my father caught sight of was fastened, at no great 
height from the ground, round the branch of a strong 
sucker that had grown from the roots of the chestnut 
tree, and going thence for a couple of feet or so towards 
the place where the parent tree became hollow, it dis- 
appeared into the cavity below. My father had little 
difficulty in swarming the sucker till he reached the 
bough on to which the flax was tied, and soon found 
himself hauling up something from the bottom of the 
tree. In less time than it takes to tell the tale he saw 
his own familiar red blanket begin to show above the 
broken edge of the hollow, and in another second there 
was a clinkum-clankum as the bundle fell upon the 
ground. This was caused by the billy and the pannikin, 
which were wrapped inside the blanket. As for the 
blanket, it had been tied tightly at both ends, as well as 
at several points between, and my father inwardly com- 
plimented the Professors on the neatness with which 
they had packed and hidden their purchase. "But," he 



The Professors' Hoard 67 

said to himself with a laugh, "I think one of them must 
have got on the other's back to reach that bough." 

'*0f course," thought he, "they will have taken the 
nuggets with them." And yet he had seemed to hear 
a dumping as well as a clinkum-clankum. He undid 
the blanket, carefully untying every knot and keeping 
the flax. When he had unrolled it, he found to his very 
pleasurable surprise that the pannikin was inside the 
billy, and the nuggets with the receipt inside the panni- 
kin. The paper containing the tea having been torn, 
was wrapped up in a handkerchief marked with 
Hanky's name. 

''Down, conscience, down!" he exclaimed as he 
transferred the nuggets, receipt, and handkerchief to 
his own pocket. *'Eye of my soul that you are! if you 
offend me I must pluck you out." His conscience 
feared him and said nothing. As for the tea he left it 
in its torn paper. 

He then put the billy, pannikin, and tea back again 
inside the blanket, which he tied neatly up, tie for tie 
with the Professor's own flax, leaving no sign of any 
disturbance. He again swarmed the sucker, till he 
reached the bough to which the blanket and its contents 
had been made fast, and having attached the bundle, he 
dropped it back into the hollow of the tree. He did 
everything quite leisurely, for the Professors would be 
sure to wait till nightfall before coming to fetch their 
property away. 

"li I take nothing but the nuggets," he argued, "each 
of the Professors will suspect the other of having con- 
jured them into his own pocket while the bundle was 
being made up. As for the handkerchief, they must 
think what they like ; but it will puzzle Hanky to know 



68 Erewhon Revisited 

why Panky should have been so anxious for a receipt, 
if he meant stealing the nuggets. Let them muddle it 
out their own way." 

Reflecting further, he concluded, perhaps rightly, 
that they had left the nuggets where he had found 
them, because neither could trust the other not to filch 
a few, if he had them in his own possession, and they 
could not make a nice division without a pair of scales. 
*'At any rate," he said to himself, ''there will be a pretty 
quarrel when they find them gone." 

Thus charitably did he brood over things that were 
not to happen. The discovery of the Professors' hoard 
had refreshed him almost as much as his sleep had 
done, and it being now past seven, he lit his pipe — 
which, however, he smoked as furtively as he had done 
when he was a boy at school, for he knew not whether 
smoking had yet become an Erewhonian virtue or no 
— and walked briskly on towards Sunch'ston. 



CHAPTER VII 

SIGNS OF THE NEW ORDER OF THINGS CATCH MY 
father's eye on EVERY SIDE 

He had not gone far before a turn in the path — now 
rapidly widening — showed him two high towers, 
seemingly some two miles off; these he felt sure must 
be at Sunch'ston, he therefore stepped out, lest he 
should find the shops shut before he got there. 

On his former visit he had seen little of the town, 
for he was in prison during his whole stay. He had 
had a glimpse of it on being brought there by the peo- 
ple of the village where he had spent his first night in 
Erewhon — a village which he had seen at some little 
distance on his right hand, but which it would have 
been out of his way to visit, even if he had wished to 
dp so ; and he had seen the Museum of old machines, 
but on leaving the prison he had been blindfolded. 
Nevertheless he felt sure that if the towers had been 
there he should have seen them, and rightly guessed 
that they must belong to the temple which was to be 
dedicated to himself on Sunday. 

When he had passed through the suburbs he found 
himself in the main street. Space will not allow me to 
dwell on more than a few of the things which caught 
his eye, and assured him that the change in Erewhon- 
ian habits and opinions had been even more cataclys- 
mic than he had already divined. The first important 

69 



70 Erewhon Revisited 

building that he came to proclaimed itself as the Col- 
lege of Spiritual Athletics, and in the window of a 
shop that was evidently affiliated to the college he saw 
an announcement that moral try-your-strengths, suit- 
able for every kind of ordinary temptation, would be 
provided on the shortest notice. Some of those that 
aimed at the more common kinds of temptation were 
kept in stock, but these consisted chiefly of trials to the 
temper. On dropping, for example, a penny into a 
slot, you could have a jet of fine pepper, flour, or brick- 
dust, whichever you might prefer, thrown on to your 
face, and thus discover whether your composure stood 
in need of further development or no. My father 
gathered this from the writing that was pasted on to 
the try-your-strength, but he had no time to go inside 
the shop and test either the machine or his own tem- 
per. Other temptations to irritability required the 
agency of living people, or at any rate living beings. 
Crying children, screaming parrots, a spiteful monkey, 
might be hired on ridiculously easy terms. He saw 
one advertisement, nicely framed, which ran as fol- 
lows: 

''Mrs. Tantrums, Nagger, certificated by the College of 
Spiritual Athletics. Terms for ordinary nagging, two 
shillings and sixpence per hour. Hysterics extra." 

Then followed a series of testimonials — for ex- 
ample : — 

"Dear Mrs. Tantrums, — I have for years been tortured 
with a husband of unusually peevish, irritable temper, who 
made my life so intolerable that I sometimes answered 
him in a way that led to his using personal violence 
towards me. After taking a course of twelve sittings from 
you, I found my husband's temper comparatively angelic, 



The New Order 71 

and we have ever since lived together in complete har- 
mony." 

Another was from a husband: — 

"Mr. presents his compliments to Mrs. Tantrums, 

and begs to assure her that her extra special hysterics 
have so far surpassed anything his wife can do, as to 
render him callous to those attacks which he had formerly 
found so distressing." 

There were many others of a like purport, but time 
did not permit my father to do more than glance at 
them. He contented himself with the two following, 
of which the first ran : — 

"He did try it at last. A little correction of the right 
kind taken at the right moment is invaluable. No more 
swearing. No more bad language of any kind. A lamb- 
like temper ensured in about twenty minutes, by a single 
dose of one of our spiritual indigestion tabloids. In cases 
of all the more ordinary moral ailments, from simple lying, 
to homicidal mania, in cases again of tendency to hatred, 
malice, and uncharitableness ; of atrophy or hypertrophy 
of the conscience, of costiveness or diarrhoea of the sym- 
pathetic instincts, &c., &c., our spiritual indigestion tabloids 
tvill afford unfailing and immediate relief. 

"N. B. — A bottle or two of our Sunchild Cordial will 
assist the operation of the tabloids." 

The second and last that I can give was as fol- 
lows : — 

"All else is useless. If you wish to be a social success, 
make yourself a good listener. There is no short cut to 
this. A would-be listener must learn the rudiments of his 
art and go through the mill like other people. If he would 
develop a power of suffering fools gladly, he must begin by 
suffering them without the gladness. Professor Proser, 
ex-straightener, certificated bore, pragmatic or coruscating. 



72 Erewhon Revisited 

■with or without anecdotes, attends pupils at their own 
houses. Terms moderate. 

"Mrs. Proser, whose success as a professional mind- 
dresser is so well known that lengthened advertisement is 
unnecessary, prepares ladies or gentlemen with appropriate 
remarks to be made at dinner-parties or at-homes. Mrs. P. 
keeps herself well up to date with all the latest scandals." 

"Poor, poor, straighteners !'' said my father to him- 
self. "Alas ! that it should have been my fate to ruin 
you — for I suppose your occupation is gone." 

Tearing himself away from the College of Spiritual 
Athletics and its affiliated shop, he passed on a few- 
doors, only to find himself looking in at what was 
neither more nor less than a chemist's shop. In the 
window there were advertisements which showed that 
the practice of medicine was now legal, but my father 
could not stay to copy a single one of the fantastic an- 
nouncements that a hurried glance revealed to him. 

It was also plain here, as from the shop already 
more fully described, that the edicts against machines 
had been repealed, for there were physical try-your- 
strengths, as in the other shop there had been moral 
ones, and such machines under the old law would not 
have been tolerated for a moment. 

My father made his purchases just as the last shops 
were closing. He noticed that almost all of them were 
full of articles labelled "Dedication." There was 
Dedication gingerbread, stamped with a moulder rep- 
resentation of the new temple; there were Dedication 
syrups, Dedication pocket-handkerchiefs, also shew- 
ing the temple, and in one corner giving a highly ideal- 
ised portrait of my father himself. The chariot and 
the horses figured largely, and in the confectioners* 



The New Order 73 

shops there were models of the newly discovered relic 
— made, so my father thought, with a little heap of 
cherries or strawberries, smothered in chocolate. Out- 
side one tailor's shop he saw a flaring advertisement 
which can only be translated, "Try our Dedication 
trousers, price ten shillings and sixpence." 

Presently he passed the new temple, but it was too 
dark for him to do more than see that it was a vast 
fane, and must have cost an untold amount of money. 
At every turn he found himself more and more 
shocked, as he realised more and more fully the mis- 
chief he had already occasioned, and the certainty that 
this was small as compared with that which would 
grow up hereafter. 

''What," he said to me, very coherently and quietly, 
''was I to do? I had struck a bargain with that dear 
fellow, though he knew not what I meant, to the effect 
that I should try to undo the harm I had done, by 
standing up before the people on Sunday and saying 
who I was. True, they would not believe me. They 
would look at my hair and see it black, whereas it 
should be very light. On this they would look no fur- 
ther, but very likely tear me to pieces then and there. 
Suppose that the authorities held a post-mortem ex- 
amination, and that many who knew me (let alone that 
all my measurements and marks were recorded twenty 
years ago) identified the body as mine: would those in 
power admit that I was the Sunchild ? Not they. The 
interests vested in my being now in the palace of the 
sun are too great to allow of my having been torn to 
pieces in Sunch'ston, no matter how truly I had been 
torn; the whole thing would be hushed up, and the 



74 Erewhon Revisited 

utmost that could come of it would be a heresy which 
would in time be crushed. 

''On the other hand, what business have I with 
Vould be' or 'would not be ?' Should I not speak out, 
come what may, when I see a whole people being led 
astray by those who are merely exploiting them for 
their own ends? Though I could do but little, ought 
I not to do that little? What did that good fellow's 
instinct — so straight from heaven, so true, so healthy 
— tell him? What did my own instinct answer? 
What would the conscience of any honourable man 
answer ? Who can doubt ? 

"And yet, is there not reason? and is it not God- 
given as much as instinct? I remember having heard 
an anthem in my young days, 'O where shall wisdom 
be found? the deep saith it is not in me.' As the sing- 
ers kept on repeating the question, I kept on saying 
sorrowfully to myself — *Ah, where, where, where?' 
and when the triumphant answer came. The fear of 
the Lord, that is wisdom, and to depart from evil is 
understanding,' I shrunk ashamed into myself for not 
having foreseen it. In later life, when I have tried to 
use this answer as a light by which I could walk, I 
found it served but to the raising of another question, 
'What is the fear of the Lord, and what is evil in this 
particular case?' And my easy method with spiritual 
dilemmas proved to be but a case of ignotum per 
ignotius. 

"If Satan himself is at times transformed into an 
angel of light, are not angels of light sometimes trans- 
formed into the likeness of Satan? If the devil is not 
so black as he is painted, is God always so white ? And 
is there not another place in which it is said, 'The fear 



The New Order 75 

of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom/ as though it 
were not the last word upon tlie subject? If a man 
should not do evil that good may come, so neither 
should he do good that evil may come ; and though it 
were good for me to speak out, should I not do better 
by refraining? 

"Such were the lawless and uncertain thoughts that 
tortured me very cruelly, so that I did what I had not 
done for many a long year — I prayed for guidance. 
'Shew me Thy will, O Lord,' I cried in great distress, 
'and strengthen me to do it when Thou hast shewn it 
me.' But there was no answer. Instinct tore me one 
way and reason another. Whereon I settled that I 
would obey the reason with which God had endowed 
me, unless the instinct He had also given me should 
thrash it out of me. I could get no further than this, 
that the Lord hath mercy on whom He will have 
mercy, and whom He willeth He hardeneth ; and again 
I prayed that I might be among those on whom He 
would shew His mercy. 

"This was the strongest internal conflict that I ever 
remember to have felt, and it was at the end of it that 
I perceived the first, but as yet very faint, symptoms of 
that sickness from which I shall not recover. Whether 
this be a token of mercy or no, my Father which is in 
heaven knows, but I know not." 

From what my father afterwards told me, I do not 
think the above reflections had engrossed him for 
more than three or four minutes ; the giddiness which 
had for some seconds compelled him to lay hold of the 
first thing he could catch at in order to avoid falling, 
passed away without leaving a trace behind it, and his 
path seemed to become comfortably clear before him. 



76 Erewhon Revisited 

He settled it that the proper thing to do would be to 
buy some food, start back at once while his permit was 
still valid, help himself to the property which he had 
sold to the Professors, leaving the Erewhonians to 
wrestle as they best might with the lot that it had 
pleased Heaven to send them. 

This, however, was too heroic a course. He was 
tired, and wanted a night's rest in a bed; he was 
hungry, and wanted a substantial meal; he was curi- 
ous, moreover, to see the temple dedicated to himself, 
and hear Hanky's sermon; there was also his further 
difficulty, he would have to take what he had sold the 
Professors without returning them their £4, los., for 
he could not do without his blanket, &c. ; and even 
if he left a bag of nuggets made fast to the sucker, he 
must either place it where it could be seen so easily that 
it would very likely get stolen, or hide it so cleverly 
that the Professors would never find it. He there- 
fore compromised by concluding that he would sup 
and sleep in Sunch'ston, get through the morrow as he 
best could without attracting attention, deepen the 
stain on his face and hair, and rely on the change so 
made in his appearance to prevent his being recognised 
at the dedication of the temple. He would do nothing 
to disillusion the people — to do this would only be 
making bad worse. As soon as the service was over, 
he would set out towards the preserves, and, when it 
was well dark, make for the statues. He hoped that 
on such a great day the rangers might be many of 
them in Sunch'ston; if there were any about, he must 
trust to the moonless night and his own quick eyes and 
ears to get him through the preserves safely. 

The shops were by this time closed, but the keepers 



The New Order 77 

of a few stalls were trying by lamplight to sell the 
wares they had not yet got rid of. One of these was 
a bookstall, and, running his eye over some of the 
volumes, my father saw one entitled — 

"The Sayings of the Sunchild during his stay in 
Erewhon, to which is added a true account of 
his return to the palace of the sun with his 
Erewhonian bride. This is the only version autho- 
rised by the Presidents and Vice-Presidents of the 
Musical Banks; all other versions being imperfect 
and inaccurate. — Bridgeford, XVIII, 150 pp. 8vo, 
Price 3s. 

The reader will understand that I am giving the 
prices as nearly as I can in their English equivalents. 
Another title was — 

"The Sacrament of Divorce: an Occasional Sermon 
preached by Dr. Gurgoyle, President of the Musical 
Banks for the Province of Sunch'ston. 8vo, 16 pp. 
6d. 

Other titles ran — 

"Counsels of Imperfection." 8vo, 20 pp. 6d. 
"Hygiene; or, How to Diagnose your Doctor. 8vo, 
10 pp. 3d. 

"The Physics of Vicarious Existence," by Dr._ Gur- 
goyle, President of the Musical Banks for the Pro- 
vince of Sunch'ston. Svo, 20 pp. 6d. 

There were many other books whose titles would 
probably have attracted my father as much as those 
that I have given, but he was too tired and hungry to 
look at more. Finding that he could buy all the fore- 
going for 4s 9d., he bought them and stuffed them into 
the valise that he had just bought. His purchases in 
all had now amounted to a little over £1, los. (silver), 



78 Erewhon Revisited 

leaving him about £3 (silver), including the money 
for which he had sold the quails, to carry him on till 
Sunday afternoon. He intended to spend say £2 
(silver), and keep the rest of the money in order to 
give it to the British Museum. 

He now began to search for an inn, and walked 
about the less fashionable parts of the town till he 
found an unpretending tavern, which he thought would 
suit him. Here, on importunity, he was given a ser- 
vant's room at the top of the house, all others being 
engaged by visitors who had come for the dedication. 
He ordered a meal, of which he stood in great need, 
and having eaten it, he retired early for the night. But 
he smoked a pipe surreptitiously up the chimney before 
he got into bed. 

Meanwhile other things were happening, of which, 
happily for his repose, he was still ignorant, and which 
he did not learn till a few days later. Not to depart 
from chronological order I will deal with them in my 
next chapter. 



CHAPTER VIII 

VRAM, NOW MAYORESS, GIVES A DINNER-PARTY, IN THE 
COURSE OF WHICH SHE IS DISQUIETED BY WHAT 
SHE LEARNS FROM PROFESSOR HANKY : SHE SENDS 
FOR HER SON GEORGE AND QUESTIONS HIM 

The Professors, returning to their hotel early on 
the Friday morning, found a note from the Mayoress 
urging them to be her guests during the remainder of 
their visit, and to meet other friends at dinner on the 
same evening. They accepted, and then went to bed ; 
for they had passed the night under the tree in which 
they had hidden their purchase, and, as may be imag- 
ined, had slept but little. They rested all day, and 
transferred themselves and their belongings to the 
Mayor's house in time to dress for dinner. 

When they came down into the drawing-room they 
found a brilliant company assembled, chiefly Musical- 
Bankical like themselves. There was Dr. Downie, 
Professor of Logomachy, and perhaps the most subtle 
dialectician in Erewhon. He could say nothing in 
more words than any man of his generation. His 
text-book on the "Art of Obscuring Issues" had 
passed through ten or twelve editions, and was in the 
hands of all aspirants for academic distinction. He 
had earned a high reputation for sobriety of judgment 
by resolutely refusing to have definite views on any 
subject; so safe a man was he considered, that while 

79 



8o Erewhon Revisited 

still quite young he had been appointed to the lucrative 
post of Thinker in Ordinary to the Royal Family. 
There was Mr. Principal Crank, with his sister Mrs. 
Quack; Professors Gabb and Bawl, with their wives 
and two qt three erudite daughters. 

Old Mrs. Humdrum (of which more anon) was 
there of course, with her venerable white hair and rich 
black satin dress, looking the very ideal of all that a 
stately old dowager ought to be. In society she was 
commonly known as Ydgrun, so perfectly did she cor- 
respond with the conception of this strange goddess 
formed by the Erewhonians. She w^as one of those 
who had visited my father when he was in prison 
twenty years earlier. When he told me that she was 
now called Ydgrun, he said, 'T am sure that the 
Erinyes were only Mrs. Humdrums, and that they 
were delightful people when you came to know them. 
I do not believe they did the awful things we say they 
did. I think, but am not quite sure, that they let 
Orestes off; but even though they had not pardoned 
him, I doubt whether they would have done anything 
more dreadful to him than issue a 7not d'ordre that 
he was not to be asked to any more afternoon teas. 
This, however, would be down-right torture to some 
people. At any rate," he continued, ''be it the Erinyes, 
or Mrs. Grundy, or Ydgrun, in all times and places it 
is woman who decides whether society is to condone 
an offence or no." 

Among the most attractive ladies present was one 
for whose Erewhonian name I can find no English 
equivalent, and whom I must therefore call Miss La 
Frime. She was Lady President of the principal 
establishment for the higher education of young ladies, 



Yram Guesses the Truth 8i 

and so celebrated was she, that pupils flocked to her 
from all parts of the surrounding country. Her 
primer (written for the Erewhonian Arts and Science 
Series) on the Art of Man-killing, was the most com- 
plete thing of the kind that had yet been done; but 
ill-natured people had been heard to say that she had 
killed all her own admirers so effectually that not one 
of them had ever lived to marry her. According to 
Erewhonian custom the successful marriages of the 
pupils are inscribed yearly on the oak panelling of the 
college refectory, and a reprint from these in pamphlet 
form accompanies all the prospectuses that are sent 
out to parents. It was alleged that no other ladies' 
seminary in Erewhon could show such a brilliant 
record during all the years of Miss La Frime's presi- 
dency. Many other guests of less note were there, but 
the lions of the evening were the two Professors whom 
we have already met with, and more particularly 
Hanky, who took the Mayoress in to dinner. Panky, 
of course, Avore his clothes reversed, as did Principal 
Crank and Professor Gabb; the others were dressed 
English fashion. 

Everything hung upon the hostess, for the host was 
little more than a still handsome figure-head. He had 
been remarkable for his good looks as a young man, 
and Strong is the nearest approach I can get to a 
translation of his Erewhonian name. His face in- 
spired confidence at once, but he was a man of few 
words, and had little of that grace which in his wife 
set every one instantly at his or her ease. He knew 
that all would go well so long as he left everything to 
her, and kept himself as far as might be in the back- 
ground. 



\ 
\ 



82 Erewhon Revisited 

Before dinner was announced there was the usual 
buzz of conversation, chiefly occupied with saluta- 
tions, good wishes for Sunday's weather, and admira- 
tion for the extreme beauty of the Mayoress's three 
daughters, the two elder of whom were already out; 
while the third, though only thirteen, might have 
passed for a year or two older. Their mother was so 
much engrossed with receiving her guests that it was 
not till they were all at table that she was able to ask 
Hanky what he thought of the statues, which she had 
heard that he and Professor Panky had been to see. 
She was told how much interested he had been with 
them, and how unable he had been to form any theory 
as to their date or object. He then added, appealingly 
to Panky, who was on the Mayoress's left hand, "but 
we had rather a strange adventure on our way down, 
had we not, Panky ? We got lost, and were benighted 
in the forest. Happily we fell in with one of the 
rangers who had lit a fire." 

*'Do I understand, then," said Yram, as I suppose 
we may as well call her, "that you were out all last 
night ? How tired you must be ! But I hope you had 
enough provisions with you?" 

"Indeed we were out all night. We staid by the 
ranger's fire till midnight, and then tried to find our 
way down, but we gave it up soon after we had got 
out of the forest, and then waited under a large chest- 
nut tree till four or five this morning. As for food, 
we had not so much as a mouthful from about three 
in the afternoon till we got to our inn early this mom- 
ing." 

"Oh, you poor, poor people! how tired you must 
be." 



Yram Guesses the Truth 83 

"No; we made a good breakfast as soon as we got 
in, and then went to bed, where we staid till it was 
time for us to come to your house." 

Here Panky gave his friend a significant look, as 
much as to say that he had said enough. 

This set Hanky on at once. '* Strange to say, the 
ranger was wearing the old Erewhonian dress. It 
did me good to see it again after all these years. It 
seems your son lets his men wear what few of the old 
clothes they may still have, so long as they keep well 
away from the town. But fancy how carefully these 
poor fellows husband them; why, it must be seven- 
teen years since the dress was forbidden!" 

We all of us have skeletons, large or small, in some 
cupboard of our lives, but a well regulated skeleton 
that will stay in its cupboard quietly does not much 
matter. There are skeletons, however, which can 
never be quite trusted not to open the cupboard door at 
some awkward moment, go down stairs, ring the hall- 
door bell, with grinning face announce themselves as 
the skeleton, and ask whether the master or mistress is 
at home. This kind of skeleton, though no bigger than 
2l rabbit, will sometimes loom large as that of a dino- 
therium. My father was Yram's skeleton. True, he 
was a mere skeleton of a skeleton, for the chances were 
thousands to one that he and my mother had perished 
long years ago; and even though he rang at the bell, 
there was no harm that he either could or would now 
do to her or hers ; still, so long as she did not certainly 
know that he v/as dead, or otherwise precluded from 
returning, she could not be sure that he would not one 
day come back by the way that he would alone know, 
and she had rather he should not do so. 



84 Erewhon Revisited 

Hence, on hearing from Professor Hanky that a 
man had been seen between the statues and Sunch'ston 
wearing the old Erewhonian dress, she was disquieted 
and perplexed. The excuse he had evidently made to 
the Professors aggravated her uneasiness, for it was 
an obvious attempt to escape from an unexpected dif- 
ficulty. There could be no truth in it. Her son would 
as soon think of wearing the old dress himself as of 
letting his men do so; and as for having old clothes 
still to wear out after seventeen years, no one but a 
Bridge ford Professor would accept this. She saw, 
therefore, that she must keep her wits about her, and 
lead her guests on to tell her as much as they could be 
induced to do. 

"My son," she said innocently, *'is always consider- 
ate to his men, and that is why they are so devoted to 
him. I wonder which of them it was? In what part 
of the preserves did you fall in with him?" 

Hanky described the place, and gave the best idea 
he could of my father's appearance. 

"Of course he was swarthy like the rest of us?" 

'T saw nothing remarkable about him, except that 
his eyes were blue and his eyelashes nearly white, 
which, as you know, is rare in Erewhon. Indeed, I 
do not remember ever before to have seen a man with 
dark hair and complexion but light eyelashes. Nature 
is always doing something unusual." 

"I have no doubt,'' said Yram, "that he was the man 
they call Blacksheep, but I never noticed this pecu- 
liarity in him. If he was Blacksheep, I am afraid you 
must have found him none too civil ; he is a rough dia- 
mond, and you would hardly be able to understand his 
uncouth Sunch'ston dialect." 



Yram Guesses the Truth 85 

"On the contrary, he was most kind and thoughtful 
— even so far as to take our permit from us, and thus 
save us the trouble of giving it up at your son's office. 
As for his dialect, his grammar was often at fault, but 
we could quite understand him." 

"I am glad to hear he behaved better than I could 
have expected. Did he say in what part of the pre- 
serves he had been?" 

"He had been catching quails between the place 
where we saw him and the statutes ; he was to deliver 
three dozen to your son this afternoon for the Mayor's 
banquet on Sunday." 

This was worse and worse. She had urged her son 
to provide her with a supply of quails for Sunday's 
banquet, but he had begged her not to insist on having 
them. There was no close time for them in Erewhon, 
but he set his face against their being seen at table in 
spring and summer. During the winter, when any 
great occasion arose, he had allowed a few brace to be 
provided. 

'T asked my son to let me have some," said Yram, 
who was now on full scent. She laughed genially as 
she added, "Can you throw any light upon the ques- 
tion whether I am likely to get my three dozen? I 
have had no news as yet." 

"The man had taken a good many; we saw them 
but did not count them. He started about midnight 
for the ranger's shelter, where he said he should sleep 
till daybreak, so as to make up his full tale betimes." 

Yram had heard her son complain that there were 
no shelters on the preserves, and state his intention of 
having some built before the winter. Here too, then, 
the man's story must be false. She changed the con- 



86 Erewhon Revisited 

versation for the moment, but quietly told a servant to 
send high and low in search of her son, and if he could 
be found, to bid him come to her at once. She then 
returned to her previous subject. 

''And did not this heartless wretch, knowing how 
hungry you must both be, let you have a quail or two 
as an act of pardonable charity?" 

**My dear Mayoress, how can you ask such a ques- 
tion? We knew you would want all you could get; 
moreover, our permit threatened us with all sorts of 
horrors if we so much as ate a single quail. I assure 
you we never even allowed a thought of eating one of 
them to cross our minds.'* 

"Then," said Yram to herself, *'they gorged upon 
them." What could she think? A man who wore 
the old dress, and therefore who had almost certainly 
been in Erewhon, but had been many years away from 
it; who spoke the language well, but whose grammar 
was defective — hence, again, one who had spent some 
time in Erewhon ; who knew nothing of the afforesting 
law now long since enacted, for how else would he 
have dared to light a fire and be seen with quails in 
his possession; an adroit liar, who on gleaning infor- 
mation from the Professors had hazarded an excuse 
for immediately retracing his steps; a man, too, with 
blue eyes and light eyelashes. What did it matter 
about his hair being dark and his complexion swarthy 
— Higgs was far too clever to attempt a second visit 
to Erewhon without dyeing his hair and staining his 
face and hands. And he had got their permit out of 
the Professors before he left them; clearly, then, he 
meant coming back, and coming back at once before 
the permit had expired. How could she doubt? My 



Yram Guesses the Truth 87 

father, she felt sure, must by this time be in Sunch'- 
ston. He would go back to change his clothes, which 
would not be very far down on the other side the pass, 
for he would not put on his old Erewhonian dress till 
he w^as on the point of entering Erewhon; and he 
would hide his English dress rather than throw it 
away, for he would want it when he went back again. 
It would be quite possible, then, for him to get through 
the forest before the permit was void, and he would 
be sure to go on to Sunch'ston for the night. 

She chatted unconcernedly, now with one guest now 
with another, while they in their turn chatted uncon- 
cernedly with one another. 

Miss La Frime to Mrs. Humdrum : ''You know how 
he got his professorship? No? I thought every one 
knew that. The question the candidates had to an- 
swer was, whether it was wiser during a long stay at 
a hotel to tip the servants pretty early, or to wait till 
the stay was ended. All the other candidates took one 
side or the other, and argued their case in full. Hanky 
sent in three lines to the effect that the proper thing 
j:o do would be to promise at the beginning, and go 
away without giving. The King, with whom the ap- 
pointment rested, was so much pleased with this an- 
swer that he gave Hanky the professorship without so 
much as looking . , y 

Professor Gabb to Mrs. Humdrum : "Oh, no, I can 
assure you there is no truth in it. What happened 
was this. There was the usual crowd, and the people 
cheered Professor after Professor, as he stood before 
them in the great Bridge ford theatre and satisfied them 
that a lump of butter which had been put into his 
mouth would not melt in it. When Hanky's turn came 



88 Erewhon Revisited 

he was taken suddenly unwell, and had to leave the 
theatre, on which there was a report in the house that 
the butter had melted ; this was at once stopped by the 
return of the Professor. Another piece of butter was 
put into his mouth, and on being taken out after the 
usual time, was found to show no signs of having . . /' 

Miss Bawl to Mr. Principal Crank: . . . "The 
Manager was so tall, you know, and then there was 
that little mite of an assistant manager — it was so 
funny. For the assistant manager's voice was ever so 
much louder than the ..." 

Mrs. Bawl to Professor Gabb: . . . "Live for art! 
If I had to choose whether I would lose either art or 
science, I have not the smallest hesitation in saying 
that I would lose . . ." 

The Mayor and Dr. Downie: . . . "That you are 
to be canonised at the close of the year along with 
Professors Hanky and Panky?'* 

"I believe it is his Majesty's intention that the Pro- 
fessors and myself are to head the list of the Sun- 
child's Saints, but we have all of us got to ... " 

And so on, and so on, buzz, buzz, buzz, over the 
whole table. Presently Yram turned to Hanky and 
said — 

"By the way. Professor, you must have found it 
very cold up at the statues, did you not? But I sup- 
pose the snow is all gone by this time?" 

"Yes, it was cold, and though the winter's snow is 
melted, there had been a recent fall. Strange to say, 
we saw fresh footprints in it, as of some one who had 
come up from the other side. But thereon hangs a 
tale, about which I believe I should say nothing." 

"Then say nothing, my dear Professor," said Yram 



Yram Guesses the Truth 89 

with a frank smile. ''Above all," she added quietly and 
gravely, ''say nothing to the Mayor, nor to my son, 
till after Sunday. Even a whisper of some one com- 
ing over from the other side disquiets them, and they 
have enough on hand for the moment." 

Panky, who had been growing more and more res- 
tive at his friend's outspokenness, but who had en- 
couraged it more than once by vainly trying to check 
it, was relieved at hearing his hostess do for him what 
he could not do for himself. As for Yram, she had got 
enough out of the Professor to be now fully dissatis- 
fied, and mentally informed them that they might 
leave the witness-box. During the rest of dinner she 
let the subject of their adventure severely alone. 

It seemed to her as though dinner was never going 
to end; but in the course of time it did so, and pres- 
ently the ladies withdrew. As they were entering the 
drawing-room a servant told her that her son had been 
found more easily than was expected, and wa3» now 
in his own room dressing. 

"Tell him," she said, '*to stay there till I come, 
which I will do directly." 

She remained for a few minutes with her guests, 
and then, excusing herself quietly to Mrs. Humdrum, 
she stepped out and hastened to her son's room. She 
told him that Professors Hanky and Panky were stay- 
ing in the house, and that during dinner they had told 
her something he ought to know, but which there was 
no time to tell him until her guests were gone. "I had 
rather," she said, *'tell you about it before you see the 
Professors, for if you see them the whole thing will 
be reopened, and you are sure to let them see how 
much more there is in it than they suspect. I want 



90 Erewhon Revisited 

everything hushed up for the moment; do not, there- 
fore, join us. Have dinner sent to you in your 
father's study. I will come to you about midnight.^' 

"But, my dear mother," said George, '1 have seen 
Panky already. I walked down with him a good long 
way this afternoon." 

Yram had not expected this, but she kept her coun- 
tenance. "How did you know," said she, "that he 
was Professor Panky? Did he tell you so?" 

"Certainly he did. He showed me his permit, which 
was made out in favour of Professors Hanky and 
Panky, or either of them. He said Hanky had been 
unable to come with him, and that he was himself 
Professor Panky." 

Yram again smiled very sweetly. "Then, my dear 
boy," she said, "I am all the more anxious that you 
should not see him now. See nobody but the ser- 
vants and your brothers, and wait till I can enlighten 
you. I must not stay another moment; but tell me 
this much, have you seen any signs of poachers 
lately?" 

"Yes ; there were three last night." 

"In what part of the preserves?" 

Her son described the place. 

"You are sure they had been killing quails?" 

"Yes, and eating them — two on one side of a fire 
they had lit, and one on the other; this last man had 
done all the plucking.*' 

"Good!" 

She kissed him with more than even her usual ten- 
derness, and returned to the drawing-room. 

During the rest of the evening she was engaged in 
earnest conversation with Mrs. Humdrum, leaving her 



Yram Guesses the Truth 91 

other guests to her daughters and to themselves. Mrs. 
Humdrum had been her closest friend for many years, 
and carried more weight than any one else in Sunch'- 
ston, except, perhaps, Yram herself. "Tell him every- 
thing," she said to Yram at the close of their conversa- 
tion; "we all dote upon him; trust him frankly, as you 
trusted your husband before you let him marry you. 
No lies, no reserves, no tears, and all will come right. 
As for me, command me," and the good old lady rose 
to take her leave with as kind a look on her face as 
ever irradiated saint or angel. "I go early," she 
added, *'for the others will go when they see me do 
so, and the sooner you are alone the better." 

By half an hour before midnight her guests had 
gone. Hanky and Panky were given to understand 
that they must still be tired, and had better go to bed. 
So was the Mayor; so were her sons and daughters, 
except of course George, who was waiting for her 
with some anxiety, for he had seen that she had some- 
thing serious to tell him. Then she went down into 
the study. Her son embraced her as she entered, and 
moved an easy chair for her, but she would not 
^have it. 

''No; I will have an upright one." Then, sitting 
composedly down on the one her son placed for her, 
she said — 

"And now to business. But let me first tell you that 
the Mayor was told, twenty years ago, all the more 
important part of what you will now hear. He does 
not yet know what has happened within the last few 
hours, but either you or I will tell him to-morrow." 



CHAPTER IX 

INTERVIEW BETWEEN YRAM AND HER SON 

"What did you think of Panky?" 

"I could not make him out. If he had not been a 
Bridgeford Professor I might have hked him; but 
you know how we all of us distrust those people/' 

"Where did you meet him?" 

"About two hours lower down than the statues." 

"At what o'clock?" 

"It might be between two and half-past.'* 

"I suppose he did not say that at that hour he was 
in bed at his hotel in Sunch'ston. Hardly! Tell me 
what passed between you." 

"He had his permit open before we were within 
speaking distance. I think he feared I should attack 
him without making sure whether he was a foreign 
devil or no. I have told you he said he was Professor 
Panky." 

"I suppose he had a dark complexion and black hair 
like the rest of us?" 

"Dark complexion and hair purplish rather than 
black. I was surprised to see that his eyelashes were 
as light as my own, and his eyes were blue like mine — 
but you will have noticed this at dinner." 

"No, my dear, I did not, and I think I should have 
done so if it had been there to notice." 

"Oh, but it was so indeed." 

92 



Yram and Her Son 93 

'Terhaps. Was there anything strange about his 
way of talking?" 

''A little about his grammar, but these Bridgeford 
Professors have often risen from the ranks. His 
pronunciation was nearly like yours and mine.** 

"Was his manner friendly?" 

"Very; more so than I could understand at first. 
I had not, however, been with him long before I saw 
tears in his eyes, and when I asked him whether he 
was in distress, he said I reminded him of a son whom 
he had lost and had found after many years, only to 
lose him almost immediately for ever. Hence his cor- 
diality towards me." 

"Then," said Yram half hysterically to herself, "he 
knew who you were. Now, how, I wonder, did he 
find that out?" All vestige of doubt as to who the 
man might be had now left her. 

"Certainly he knew who I was. He spoke about 
you more than once, and wished us every kind of pros- 
perity, baring his head reverently as he spoke." 

"Poor fellow! Did he say anything about Higgs?" 

"A good deal, and I was surprised to find he thought 
about it all much as we do. But when I said that if 
I could go down into the hell of which Higgs used 
to talk to you while he was in prison, I should expect 
to find him in its hottest fires, he did not like it." 

"Possibly not, my dear. Did you tell him how the 
other boys, when you were at school, used sometimes 
to say you were son to this man Higgs, and that the 
people of Sunch'ston used to say so also, till the 
Mayor trounced two or three people so roundly that 
they held their tongues for the future?" 

"Not all that, but I said that silly people had be- 



94 Erewhon Revisited 

lieved me to be the Sunchild's son, and what a disgrace 
I should hold it to be son to such an impostor.'* 

*'What did he say to this?" 

"He asked whether I should feel the disgrace less if 
Higgs were to undo the mischief he had caused by 
coming back and shewing himself to the people for 
what he was. But he said it would be no use for him 
to do so, inasmuch as people would kill him but would 
not believe him.'* 

"And you said?" 

"Let him come back, speak out, and chance what 
might befall him. In that case, I should honour him, 
father or no father." 

"And he?" 

"He asked if that would be a bargain; and when I 
said it would, he grasped me warmly by the hand on 
Higgs's behalf — though what it could matter to him 
passes my comprehension." 

"But he saw that even though Higgs were to shew 
himself and say who he was, it would mean death to 
himself and no good to any one else?" 

"Perfectly." 

"Then he can have meant nothing by shaking hands 
with you. It was an idle jest. And now for your 
poachers. You do not know who they were? I will 
tell you. The two who sat on the one side the fire 
were Professors Hanky and Panky from the City of 
the People who are above Suspicion." 

"No," said George vehemently. "Impossible." 

"Yes, my dear boy, quite possible, and whether 
possibly or impossibly, assuredly true." 

"And the third man?" 

"The third man was dressed in the old costume. He 



Yram and Her Son 95 

was in possession of several brace of birds. The 
Professors vowed they had not eaten any '* 

"Oh yes, but they had," blurted out George. 

"Of course they had, my dear; and a good thing 
too. Let us return to the man in the old costume." 

"That is puzzling. Who did he say he was ?" 

"He said he was one of your men; that you had 
instructed him to provide you with three dozen quails 
for Sunday; and that you let your men wear the 
old costume if they had any of it left, provided " 

This was too much for George; he started to his 
feet. "What, my dearest mother, does all this mean? 
You have been playing with me all through. What 
is coming?" 

"A very little more, and you shall hear. This 
man staid with the Professors till nearly midnight, 
and then left them on the plea that he would finish 
the night in the Ranger's shelter " 

"Ranger's shelter, indeed! Why '* 



"Hush, my darling boy, be patient with me. He 
said he must be up betimes, to run down the rest of 
the quails you had ordered him to bring you. But 
before leaving the Professors he beguiled them into 
giving him up their permit." 

"Then," said George, striding about the room with 
his face flushed and his eyes flashing, "he was the 
man with whom I walked down this afternoon." 

"Exactly so." 

"And he must have changed his dress?" 

"Exactly so." 

"But where and how ?" 

"At some place not very far down on the other side 
the range, where he had hidden his old clothes." 



96 



Erewhon Revisited 



"And who, in the name of all that we hold most 
sacred, do you take him to have been — for I see you 
know more than you have yet told me?" 

*'My son, he was Higgs the Sunchild, father to 
that boy whom I love next to my husband more dearly 
than any one in the whole world." 

She folded her arms about him for a second, with- 
out kissing him, and left him. ''And now," she said, 
the moment she had closed the door — "and now I 
may cry." 



She did not cry for long, and having removed all 
trace of tears as far as might be, she returned to her 
son outwardly composed and cheerful. "Shall I say 
more now," she said, seeing how grave he looked, 
"or shall I leave you, and talk further with you to- 
morrow?" 

"Now — now — now !" 

"Good! A little before Higgs came here, the 
Mayor, as he now is, poor, handsome, generous to a 
fault so far as he had the wherewithal, was adored 
by all the women of his own rank in Sunch'ston. Re- 
port said that he had adored many of them in return, 
but after having known me for a very few days, he 
asked me to marry him, protesting that he was a 
changed man. I liked him, as every one else did, but I 
was not in love with him, and said so; he said he 
would give me as much time as I chose, if I would 
not point-blank refuse him; and so the matter was 
left. 

"Within a week or so Higgs was brought to the 
prison, and he had not been there long before I found 
or thought I found, that I liked him better than I 



Yram and Her Son 97 

liked Strong. I was a fool — but there ! As for Higgs, 
he hked, but did not love me. If I had let him alone 
he would have done the like by me; and let each 
other alone we did, till the day before he was taken 
down to the capital. On that day, whether through 
his fault or mine I know not — we neither of us meant 
it — it was as though Nature, my dear, was deter- 
mined that you should not slip through her fingers — 
well, on that day we took it into our heads that we 
were broken-hearted lovers — the rest followed. And 
how, my dearest boy, as I look upon you, can I feign 
repentance ? 

''My husband, who never saw Higgs, and knew 
nothing about him except the too little that I told 
him, pressed his suit, and about a month after Higgs 
had gone, having recovered my passing infatuation 
for him, I took kindly to the Ma3^or and accepted him, 
without telling him what I ought to have told him 
• — but the words stuck in my throat. I had not been 
engaged to him many days before I found that there 
was something which I should not be able to hide 
much longer. 

''You know, my dear, that my mother had been 
long dead, and I never had a sister or any near kins- 
woman. At my wits' end who I should consult, in- 
stinct drew me to Mrs. Humdrum, then a woman of 
about five-and- forty. She was a grand lady, while I 
was about the rank of one of my own housemaids. I 
had no claim on her ; I went to her as a lost dog looks 
into the faces of people on a road, and singles out the 
one who will most surely help him. I had had a good 
look at her once as she was putting on her gloves, and 
I liked the way she did it. I marvel at my own bold- 



98 Erewhon Revisited 



ness. At any rate, I asked to see her, and told her 
my story exactly as I have now told it to you. 

*"You have no mother?' she said, when she had 
heard all. 

'' 'No/ 

" Then, my dear, I will mother you myself. Higgs 
is out of the question, so Strong must marry you at 
once. We will tell him everything, and I, on your 
behalf, will insist upon it that the engagement is at an 
end. I hear good reports of him, and if we are fair 
towards him he will be generous towards us. Besides, 
I believe he is so much in love with you that he would 
sell his soul to get you. Send him to me. I can deal 
with him better than you can.' " 

"And what," said George, "did my father, as I shall 
always call him, say to all this?" 

"Truth bred chivalry in him at once. 'I will marry 
her,' he said, with hardly a moment's hesitation, 'but 
it will be better that I should not be put on any lower 
footing than Higgs was. I ought not to be denied 
anything that has been allowed to him. If I am 
trusted, I can trust myself to trust and think no evil 
either of Higgs or her. They were pestered beyond 
endurance, as I have been ere now. If I am held at 
arm's length till I am fast bound, I shall marry Yram 
just the same, but I doubt whether she and I shall 
ever be quite happy.' 

I " 'Come to my house this evening,' said Mrs. Hum- 
drum, 'and you will find Yram there.' He came, he 
found me, and within a fortnight we were man and 
wife." 

I "How much does not all this explain," said George, 
^,smiling but very gravely. "And you are going to ask 



Yram and Her Son 99 

me to forgive you for robbing me of such a father." 
"He has forgiven me, my dear, for robbing him 
of such a son. He never reproached me. From that 
day to this he has never given me a harsh word or 
even syllable. When you were born he took to you 
at once, as, indeed, who could help doing? for you 
were the sweetest child both in looks and temper that 
it is possible to conceive. Your having light hair and 
eyes made things more difficult; for this, and your 
being born, almost to the day, nine months after Higgs 
had left us, made people talk — but your father kept 
their tongues within bounds. They talk still, but they 
liked what little they saw of Higgs, they like the 
Mayor and me, and they like you the best of all; so 
they please themselves by having the thing both ways. 
Though, therefore, you are son to the Mayor, Higgs 
cast some miraculous spell upon me before he left, 
whereby my son should be in some measure his as 
well as the Mayor's. It was this miraculous spell that 
caused you to be born two months too soon, and we 
called you by Higgs's first name as though to show 
that we took that view of the matter ourselves. 
^ "Mrs. Humdrum, however, was very positive that 
there was no spell at all. She had repeatedly heard 
her father say that the Mayor's grandfather was light- 
haired and blue-eyed, and that every third generation 
in that family a light-haired son was born. The peo- 
ple believe this too. Nobody disbelieves Mrs. Hum- 
drum, but they like the miracle best, so that is how 
it has been settled. 

*T never knew whether Mrs. Humdrum told her 
husband, but I think she must ; for a place was found 
almost immediately for my husband in Mr. Hum- 



100 Erewhon Revisited 

drum's business. He made himself useful; after a 
few years he was taken into partnership, and on Mr. 
Humdrum's death became head of the firm. Between 
ourselves, he says laughingly that all his success in 
life was due to Higgs and me." 

, "I shall give Mrs. Humdrum a double dose of kiss- 
ing," said George thoughtfully, **next time I see her." 

"Oh, do, do; she will so like it. And now, my 
darling boy, tell your poor mother whether or no you 
can forgive her." 

He clasped her in his arms and kissed her again 
and again, but for a time he could find no utterance. 
Presently he smiled, and said, "Of course I do, but 
it is you who should forgive me, for was it not all 
my fault?" 

When Yram, too, had become more calm, she said, 
"It is late, and we have no time to lose. Higgs' s 
coming at this time is mere accident; if he had had 
news from Erewhon he would have known much that 
he did not know. I cannot guess why he has come — 
probably through mere curiosity, but he will hear or 
have heard — yes, you and he talked about it — of the 
temple ; being here, he will want to see the dedication. 
From what you have told me I feel sure that he will 
not make a fool of himself by saying who he is, but in 
spite of his disguise he may be recognised. I do not 
doubt that he is now in Sunch'ston; therefore, to-mor- 
row morning scour the town to find him. Tell him he 
is discovered, tell him you know from me that he is 
your father, and that I wish to see him with all good- 
will towards him. He will come. We will then talk 
to him, and show him that he must go back at once. 
You can escort him to the statues ; after passing them 



Yram and Her Son loi 

he will be safe. He will give you no trouble, but if 
he does, arrest him on a charge of poaching, and 
take him to the gaol, where we must do the best we 
can with him — but he will give you none. We need 
say nothing to the Professors. No one but ourselves 
will know of his having been here." 

On this she again embraced her son and left him. 
If two photographs could have been taken of her, 
one as she opened the door and looked fondly back 
on George, and the other as she closed it behind her, 
the second portrait would have seemed taken ten 
years later than the first. 

As for George, he went gravely but not unhappily 
to his own room. *'So that ready, plausible fellow," 
he muttered to himself, "was my own father. At any 
rate, I am not son to a fool — and he liked me." 



CHAPTER X 

MY FATHER, FEARING RECOGNITION AT SUNCH'STON, 
BETAKES HIMSELF TO THE NEIGHBOURING TOWN 
OF FAIRMEAD. 

I WILL now return to my father. Whether from 
fatigue or over-excitement, he slept only by fits and 
starts, and when awake he could not rid himself of 
the idea that, in spite of his disguise, he might be 
recognised, either at his inn or in the town, by some 
one of the many who had seen him when he was in 
prison. In this case there was no knowing what 
might happen, but at best discovery would probably 
prevent his seeing the temple dedicated to himself, 
and hearing Professor Hanky's sermon, which he was 
particularly anxious to do. 

So strongly did he feel the real or fancied danger 
he should incur by spending Saturday in Sunch'ston, 
that he rose as soon as he heard any one stirring, and 
having paid his bill, walked quietly out of the house, 
without saying where he was going. 

There was a town about ten miles off, not so im- 
portant as Sunch'ston, but having some 10,000 in- 
habitants ; he ' resolved to find accommodation there 
for the day and night, and to walk over to Sunch'ston 
in time for the dedication ceremony, which he had 
found, on inquiry, v/ould begin at eleven o'clock. 

The country between Sunch'ston and Fairmead, as 

102 



Flight to Fairmead 103 

the town just referred to was named, was still moun- 
tainous, and being well wooded as well as well watered, 
abounded in views of singular beauty; but I have no 
time to dwell on the enthusiasm with which my father 
described them to me. The road took him at right 
angles to the main road down the valley from Sunch'- 
ston to the capital, and this was one reason why he 
had chosen Fairmead rather than Clearwater, which 
was the next town lower down on the main road. He 
did not, indeed, anticipate that any one would want 
to find him, but whoever might so want would be 
more likety to go straight down the valley than to 
turn aside towards Fairmead. 

On reaching this place, he found it pretty full of 
people, for Saturday was market-day. There was 
a considerable open space in the middle of the town, 
with an arcade running round three sides of it, while 
the fourth was completely taken up by the venerable 
Musical Bank of the city, a building which had 
weathered the storms of more than five centuries. On 
the outside of the wall, abutting on the market-place, 
were three wooden sedilia, in which the Mayor and 
two coadjutors sate weekly on market-days to give 
advice, redress grievances, and, if necessary (which 
it very seldom was) to administer correction. 

My father was much interested in watching the 
proceedings in a case which he found on inquiry to 
be not infrequent. A man was complaining to the 
Mayor that his daughter, a lovely child of eight years 
old, had none of the faults common to children of her 
age, and, in fact, seemed absolutely deficient in im- 
moral sense. She never told lies, had never stolen 
so much as a lollipop, never showed any recalcitrancy 



104 Erewhon Revisited 

about saying her prayers, and by her incessant obedi- 
ence had filled her poor father and mother with the 
gravest anxiety as regards her future well-being. He 
feared it would be necessary to send her to a de- 
formatory. 

"I have generally found/' said the Mayor, gravely 
but kindly, ''that the fault in these distressing cases 
lies rather with the parent than the children. Does 
the child never break anything by accident?*' 

*'Yes," said the father. 

"And you have duly punished her for it ?" 

"Alas ! sir, I fear I only told her she was a naughty 
girl, and must not do it again." 

"Then how can you expect your child to learn those 
petty arts of deception without which she must fall 
an easy prey to any one who wishes to deceive her? 
How can she detect lying in other people unless she 
has had some experience of it in her own practice? 
How, again, can she learn when it will be well for her 
to lie, and when to refrain from doing so, unless she 
has made many a mistake on a small scale while at an 
age when mistakes do not greatly matter? The Sun- 
child (and here he reverently raised his hat), as you 
may read in chapter thirty-one of his Sayings, has 
left us a touching tale of a little boy, who, having 
cut down an apple tree in his father's garden, lamented 
his inability to tell a lie. Some commentators, in- 
deed, have held that the evidence w^as so strongly 
against the boy that no lie would have been of any 
use to him, and that his perception of this fact was 
all that he intended to convey ; but the best authorities 
take his simple words, T cannot tell a lie,' in their 
most natural sense, as being his expression of regret 



Flight to Fairmead 105 

at the way in which his education had been neglected. 
If that case had come before me, I should have pun- 
ished the boy's father, unless he could show that the 
best authorities are mistaken (as indeed they too 
generally are), and tliat under more favourable cir- 
cumstances the boy would have been able to lie, and 
would have lied accordingly. 

'There is no occasion for you to send your child 
to a deformatory. I am always averse to extreme 
measures when I can avoid them. Moreover, in a 
deformatory she would be almost certain to fall in 
with characters as intractable as her own. Take her 
home and whip her next time she so much as pulls 
about the salt. If you will do this whenever you get 
a chance, I have every hope that you will have no 
occasion to come to me again." 

"Very well, sir," said the father, *1 will do my 
best, but the child is so instinctively truthful that I 
am afraid whipping will be of little use." 

There were dther cases, none of them serious, 
which in the old days would have been treated by a 
straightener. My father had already surmised that 
the straightener had become extinct as a class, having 
been superseded by the Managers and Cashiers of the 
Musical Banks, but this became more apparent as he 
listened to the cases that next came on. These were 
dealt with quite reasonably, except that the magistrate 
always ordered an emetic and a strong purge in ad- 
dition to the rest of his sentence, as holding that all 
diseases of the moral sense spring from impurities 
within the body, which must be cleansed before there 
could be any hope of spiritual improvement. If any 
devils were found in what passed from the prisoner's 



io6 Erewhon Revisited 

body, he was to be brought up again ; for in this case 
the rest of the sentence might very possibly be re- 
mitted. 

When the Mayor and his coadjutors had done 
sitting, my father strolled round the Musical Bank 
and entered it by the main entrance, which was on 
the top of a flight of steps that went down on to the 
principal street of the town. How strange it is that, 
no matter how gross a superstition may have polluted 
it, a holy place, if hallowed by long veneration, re- 
mains always holy. Look at Delphi. What a fraud 
it was, and yet how hallowed it must ever remain. 
But letting this pass. Musical Banks, especially when 
of great age, always fascinated my father, and being 
now tired with his walk, he sat down on one of the 
many rush-bottomed seats, and (for there was no 
service at this hour) gave free rein to meditation. 

How peaceful it all was with its droning old-world 
smell of ancestor, dry rot, and stale incense. As the 
clouds came and went, the grey-green, cobweb-chas- 
tened, light ebbed and flowed over the walls and ceiling ; 
to watch the fit fulness of its streams was a sufficient 
occupation. A hen laid an egg outside and began 
to cackle — it was an event of magnitude; a peas- 
ant sharpening his scythe, a blacksmith hammering 
at his anvil, the clack of a wooden shoe upon the 
pavement, the boom of a bumble-bee, the dripping of 
the fountain, all these things, with such concert as 
they kept, invited the dewy- feathered sleep that visited 
him, and held him for the best part of an hour. 

My father has said that the Erewhonians never 
put up monuments or write epitaphs for their dead, 
and this he believed to be still true; but it was not 



Flight to Fairmead 107 

so always, and on waking his eye was caught by a 
monument of great beauty, which bore a date of about 
1550 of our era. It was to an old lady, who must 
have been very loveable if the sweet smiling face of 
her recumbent figure was as faithful to the original 
as its strongly marked individuality suggested. I need 
not give the earlier part of her epitaph, which was 
conventional enough, but my father was so struck with 
the concluding lines, that he copied them into the note- 
book which he always carried in his pocket. They 
ran: — 

I fall asleep in the full and certain hope 
That my slumber shall not be broken; 
And that though I be all-forgetting, 
Yet shall I not be all-forgotten, 
But continue that life in the thoughts and deeds 
Of those I loved. 
Into which, while the power to strive was yet vouchsafed me, 
I fondly strove to enter. 

My father deplored his inability to do justice to 
the subtle tenderness of the original, but the above 
was the nearest he could get to it. 

How different this from the opinions concerning 
a future state which he had tried to set before the 
Erewhonians some twenty years earlier. It all came 
back to him, as the storks had done, now that he was 
again in an Erewhonian environment, and he par- 
ticularly remembered how one youth had inveighed 
against our European notions of heaven and hell with 
a contemptuous flippancy that nothing but youth and 
ignorance could even palliate. 

''Sir," he had said to my father, "your heaven will 
not attract me unless I can take my clothes and my 



io8 Erewhon Revisited 

luggage. Yes; and I must lose my luggage and find 
it again. On arriving^ I must be told that it has un- 
fortunately been taken to a wrong circle, and that 
there may be some difficulty in recovering it — or it 
shall have been sent up to a mansion number five hun- 
dred thousand millions nine hundred thousand forty 
six thousand eight hundred and eleven, whereas it 
should have gone to four hundred thousand millions, 
&c., &c. ; and am I sure that I addressed it rightly? 
Then, when I am just getting cross enough to run 
some risk of being turned out, the luggage shall make 
its appearance, hat-box, umbrella, rug, golf -sticks, 
bicycle and everything else all quite correct and in 
my delight I shall tip the angel double and realise that 
I am enjoying myself. 

''Or I must have asked what I could have for break- 
fast, and be told I could have boiled eggs, or eggs 
and bacon, or filleted plaice. 'Filleted plaice,' I shall 
exclaim, 'no! not that. Have you any red mullets?' 
And the angel will say, 'Why no, sir, the gulf has 
been so rough that there has hardly any fish come in 
this three days, and there has been such a run on it 
that we have nothing left but plaice.' 

" 'Well, well,' I shall say, 'have you any kidneys ?' 

" 'You can have one kidney, sir,' will be the an- 
swer. 

" 'One kidney, indeed, and you call this heaven ! At 
any rate you will have sausages?' 

"Then the angel will say, 'We shall have some after 
Sunday, sir, but we are quite out of them at pres- 
ent.' 

"And I shall say, somewhat sulkily, 'Then I sup- 
pose I must have eggs and bacon.' 



Flight to Fairmead 109 

''But in the morning there will come up a red 
mullet, beautifully cooked, a couple of kidneys and 
three sausages browned to a turn, and seasoned with 
just so much sage and thyme as will savour without 
overwhelming them; and I shall eat everything. It 
shall then transpire that the angel knew about the 
luggage, and what I was to have for breakfast, all the 
time, but wanted to give me the pleasure of finding 
things turn out better than I had expected. Heaven 
would be a dull place without such occasional petty 
false alarms as these." 

I have no business to leave my father's story, but 
the mouth of the ox that treadeth out tlie corn should 
not be so closely muzzled that he cannot sometimes 
filch a mouthful for himself; and when I had copied 
out the foregoing somewhat irreverent paragraphs, 
which I took down (with no important addition or 
alteration) from my father's lips, I could not refrain 
from making a few reflections of my own, which I 
will ask the reader's forbearance if I lay before him. 

Let heaven and hell alone, but think of Hades, 
with Tantalus, Sisyphus, Tityus, and all the rest of 
them. How futile were the attempts of the old Greeks 
and Romans to lay before us any plausible concep- 
tion of eternal torture. What were the Danaids do- 
ing but that which each one of us has to do during 
his or her whole life? What are our bodies if not 
sieves that we are for ever trying to fill, but which 
we must refill continually without hope of being able 
to keep them full for long together? Do we mind 
this? Not so long as we can get the wherewithal 
to fill them; and the Danaids never seem to have run 
short of water. They would probably ere long take 



no Erewhon Revisited 

to clearing out any obstruction in their sieves if they 
found them getting choked. What could it matter 
to them whether the sieves got full or no ? They were 
not paid for filling them. 

Sisyphus, again ! Can any one believe that he would 
go on rolling that stone year after year and seeing 
it roll down again unless he liked seeing it? We are 
not told that there was a dragon which attacked him 
whenever he tried to shirk. If he had greatly cared 
about getting his load over the last pinch, experi- 
ence would have shown him some way of doing so. 
The probability is that he got to enjoy the downward 
rush of his stone, and very likely amused himself by 
so timing it as to cause the greatest scare to the great- 
est number of the shades that were below. 

What though Tantalus found the water shun him 
and the fruits fly from him when he tried to seize 
them? The writer of the *'Odyssey" gives us no hint 
that he was dying of thirst or hunger. The pores 
of his skin would absorb enough water to prevent the 
first, and we may be sure that he got fruit enough, 
one way or another, to keep him going. 

Tityus, as an effort after the conception of an 
eternity of torture, is not successful. What could an 
eagle matter on the liver of a man whose body covered 
nine acres? Before long he would find it an agree- 
able stimulant. If, then, the greatest minds of 
antiquity could invent nothing that should carry bet- 
ter conviction of eternal torture, is it likely that the 
conviction can be carried at all? 

Methought I saw Jove sitting on the topmost ridges 
of Olympus and confessing failure to Minerva. "I 
see, my dear," he said, "that there is no use in trying 



Flight to Fairmead iii 

to make people very happy or very miserable for long 
together. Pain, if it does not soon kill, consists not 
so much in present suffering as in the still recent mem- 
ory of a time when there was less, and in the fear 
that there will soon be more; and so happiness lies 
less in immediate pleasure than in lively recollection 
of a worse time and lively hope of better." 

As for the young gentleman above referred to, my 
father met him with the assurance that there had 
been several cases in which living people had been 
caught up into heaven or carried down into hell, and 
been allowed to return to earth and report what they 
had seen ; while to others visions had been vouchsafed 
so clearly that thousands of authentic pictures had 
been painted of both states. All incentive to good 
conduct, he had then alleged, was found to be at once 
removed from those who doubted the fidelity of these 
pictures. 

This at least was what he had then said, but I 
hardly think he would have said it at the time of 
which I am now writing. As he continued to sit in 
the Musical Bank, he took from his valise the pamphlet 
vOn 'The Physics of Vicarious Existence," by Dr. 
Gurgoyle, which he had bought on the preceding eve- 
ning, doubtless being led to choose this particular 
work by the tenor of the old lady's epitaph. 

The second title he found to run, *'Being Strictures 
on Certain Heresies concerning a Future State that 
have been Engrafted on the Sunchild's Teaching." 

My father shuddered as he read this title. "How 
long," he said to himself, "will it be before they are 
at one another's throats?" 

On reading the pamphlet, he found it added little 



112 Erewhon Revisited 

to what the epitaph had already conveyed; but it in- 
terested him, as vshowing that, however cataclysmic a 
change of national opinions may appear to be, people 
will find means of bringing the new into more or less 
conformity with the old. 

Here it is a mere truism to say that many continue 
to live a vicarious life long after they have ceased to 
be aware of living. This view is as old as the non 
omnis moriar of Horace, and we may be sure some 
thousands of years older. It is only, therefore, with 
much diffidence that I have decided to give a resume 
of opinions many of which those whom I alone wish 
to please will have laid to heart from their youth up- 
wards. In brief. Dr. Gurgoyle's contention comes 
to little more than saying that the quick are more 
dead, and the dead more quick, than we commonly 
think. To be alive, according to him, is only to be 
unable to understand how dead one is, and to be 
dead is only to be invincibly ignorant concerning our 
own livingness — for the dead would be as living as 
the living if we could only get them to believe it. 



CHAPTER XI 



PRESIDENT GURGOYLE S PAMPHLET ON THE PHYSICS 
OF VICARIOUS existence" 



Belief, like any other moving body, follows the 
path of least resistance, and this path had led Dr. 
Gurgoyle to the conviction, real or feigned, that my 
father was son to the sun, probably by the moon, 
and that his ascent into the sky with an earthly bride 
was due to the sun's interference with the laws of 
nature. Nevertheless he was looked upon as more 
or less of a survival, and was deemed lukewarm, if 
not heretical, by those who seemed to be the pillars of 
the new system. 

My father soon found that not even Panky could 
manipulate his teaching more freely than the Doctor 
had done. My father had taught tliat when a man 
^was dead there was an end of him, until he should 
rise again in the flesh at the last day, to enter into 
eternity either of happiness or misery. He had, in- 
deed, often talked of the immortality which some 
achieve even in this world ; but he had cheapened this, 
declaring it to be an unsubstantial mockery, that could 
give no such comfort in the hour of death as was 
unquestionably given by belief in heaven and hell. 

Dr. Gurgoyle, however, had an equal horror, on 
the one hand, of anything involving resumption of 
life by the body when it was once dead and on the 

"3 



114 Erewhon Revisited 

other of the view that Hfe ended with the change 
which we call death. He did not, indeed, pretend 
that he could do much to take away the sting from 
death, nor would he do this if he could, for if men 
did not fear death unduly, they would often court it 
unduly. Death can only be belauded at the cost of be- 
littling life; but he held that a reasonable assurance 
of fair fame after death is a truer consolation to the 
dying, a truer comfort to surviving friends, and a 
more real incentive to good conduct in this life, than 
any of the consolations or incentives falsely fathered 
upon the Sunchild. 

He began by setting aside every saying ascribed, 
however truly, to my father, if it made against his 
views, and by putting his own glosses on all that he 
could gloze into an appearance of being in his favour. 
I will pass over his attempt to combat the rapidly 
spreading belief in a heaven and hell such as we accept 
and will only summarise his contention that, of our 
two lives — namely, the one we live in our own persons, 
and that other life which we live in other people both 
before our reputed death and after it — the second is 
as essential a factor of our complete life as the first is, 
and sometimes more so. 

Life, he urged, lies not in bodily organs, but in 
the power to use them, and in the use that is made 
of them — that is to say, in the work they do. As 
the essence of a factory is not in the building wherein 
the work is done nor yet in the implements used in 
turning it out, but in the will-power of the master and 
in the goods he makes ; so the true life of a man is in 
his will and work, not in his body. 'Those,*' he 
argued, ''who make the life of a man reside within his 



Vicarious Existence 115 

body, are like one who should mistake the carpenter's 
tool-box for the carpenter." 

He maintained that this had been my father's teach- 
ing, for which my father heartily trusts that he may 
be forgiven. 

He went on to say that our will-power is not wholly 
limited to the working of its own special system of 
organs, but under certain conditions can work and 
be worked upon by other will-powers like itself: so 
that if, for example, A's will-power has got such hold 
on B's as to be able, through B, to work B's mechan- 
ism, what seems to have been B's action will in reality 
have been more A's than B's and this in the same real 
sense as though the physical action had been effected 
through A's own mechanical system — A, in fact, will 
have been living in B. The universally admitted 
maxim that he who does this or that by the hand of 
an agent does it himself, shews that the foregoing 
view is only a roundabout way of stating what com- 
mon sense treats as a matter of course. 

Hence, though A's individual will-power must be 
held to cease when the tools it works with are des- 
troyed or out of gear, yet, so long as any survivors 
were so possessed by it while it was still efficient, or, 
again, become so impressed by its operation on them 
through work that he has left as to act in obedience to 
his will-power rather than their own, A has a certain 
amount of bon-d fide life still remaining. His vicarious 
life is not affected by the dissolution of his body; and 
in many cases the sum total of a man's vicarious ac- 
tion and of its outcome exceeds to an almost infinite 
extent the sum total of those actions and works that 
were effected through the mechanism of his own 



Ii6 Erewhon Revisited 

physical organs. In these cases his vicarious life is 
more truly his life than any that he lived in his own 
person. 

"True," continued the Doctor, "while living in his 
own person, a man knows, or thinks he knows, what 
he is doing, whereas we have no reason to suppose 
such knowledge on the part of one whose body is al- 
ready dust ; but the consciousness of the doer has less 
to do with the livingness of the deed than people gen- 
erally admit. We know nothing of the power that 
sets our heart beating, nor yet of the beating itself 
so long as it is normal. We know nothing of our 
breathing or of our digestion, of the all-important 
work we achieved as embryos, nor of our growth from 
infancy to manhood. No one will say that these were 
not actions of a living agent, but the more normal, 
the healthier, and thus the more truly living, the agent 
is, the less he will know or have known of his own ac- 
tion. The part of our bodily life that enters into our 
consciousness is very small as compared with that of 
which we have no consciousness. What completer 
proof can we have that livingness consists in deed 
rather than in consciousness of deed? 

"The foregoing remarks are not intended to ap- 
ply so much to vicarious action in virtue, we will say, 
of a settlement, or testamentary disposition that can- 
not be set aside. Such action is apt to be too unin- 
telligent, too far from variation and quick change to 
rank as true vicarious action; indeed it is not rarely 
found to effect the very opposite of what the person 
who made the settlement or will desired. They are 
meant to apply to that more intelligent and versatile 
action engendered by affectionate remembrance. 



Vicarious Existence 117 

Nevertheless, even the compulsory vicarious action 
taken in consequence of a will, and indeed the very 
name ''will" itself, shews that though we cannot take 
either flesh or money with us, we can leave our will- 
power behind us in very efficient operation. 

'This vicarious life (on which I have insisted, I 
fear at unnecessary length, for it is so obvious that 
none can have failed to realise it) is lived by every 
one of us before death as well as after it, and is little 
less important to us than that of which we are to 
some extent conscious in our own persons. A man, 
we will say, has written a book which delights or dis- 
pleases thousands of whom he knows nothing, and 
who know nothing of him. The book, we will sup- 
pose, has considerable, or at any rate some influence 
on the action of these people. Let us suppose the 
writer fast asleep while others are enjoying his work, 
and acting in consequence of it, perhaps at long dis- 
tances from him. Which is his truest life — the one 
he is leading in them, or that equally unconscious 
Hfe residing in his own sleeping body? Can there 
be a doubt that the vicarious life is the more efficient? 

*'0r when we are waking, how powerfully does not 
the life we are living in others pain or delight us, ac- 
cording as others think ill or well of us? How truly 
do we not recognise it as part of our own existence, 
and how great an influence does not the fear of a 
present hell in men's bad thoughts, and the hope of a 
present heaven in their good ones, influence our own 
conduct? Have we not here a true heaven and a true 
hell, as compared with the efficiency of which these 
gross material ones so falsely engrafted on to the 
,Sunchild's teaching are but as the flint implements of 



Ii8 Erewhon Revisited 

a prehistoric race? *If a man/ said the Sunchild, *fear 
not man, whom he hath seen, neither will he fear God, 
whom he hath not seen/ " 

My father again assures me that he never said this. 
Returning to Dr. Gurgoyle, he continued : — 

"It may be urged that on a man's death one of the 
great factors of his life is so annihilated that no kind 
of true life can be any further conceded to him. For 
to live is to be influenced, as well as to influence; and 
when a man is dead how can he be influenced? He 
can haunt, but he cannot any more be haunted. He 
can come to us, but we cannot go to him. On ceasing, 
therefore, to be impressionable, so great a part of that 
wherein his life consisted is removed, that no true life 
can be conceded to him. 

"I do not pretend that a man is as fully alive after 
his so-called death as before it. He is not. All I con- 
tend for is that a considerable amount of efficient life 
still remains to some of us, and that a little life re- 
mains to all of us, after what we commonly regard 
as the complete cessation of life. In answer, then, to 
those who have just urged that the destruction of one 
of the two great factors of life destroys life altogether, 
I reply that the same must hold good as regards death. 

*'If to live is to be influenced and to influence, and 
if a man cannot be held as living when he can no 
longer be influenced, surely to die is to be no longer 
able either to influence or be influenced, and a man 
cannot be held dead until both these two factors of 
death are present. If failure of the power to be in- 
fluenced vitiates life, presence of the power to in- 
fluence vitiates death. And no one will deny that a man 



Vicarious Existence 119 

can influence for many a long year after he is vulgarly 
reputed as dead. 

'*It seems, then, that there is no such thing as either 
absolute life without any alloy of death, nor absolute 
death without any alloy of life, until, that is to say, 
all posthumous power to influence has faded away, 
and this, perhaps, is what the Sunchild meant by say- 
ing that in the midst of life we are in death, and so 
also that in the midst of death we are in life. 

''And there is this, too. No man can influence fully 
until he can no more be influenced — that is to say, till 
after his so-called death. Till then, his *he' is still 
unsettled. We know not what other influences may 
not be brought to bear upon him that may change the 
character of the influence he will exert on ourselves. 
Therefore, he is not fully living till he is no longer 
living. He is an incomplete work, which cannot have 
full effect till finished. And as for his vicarious life — 
which we have seen to be very real — this can be, and 
is, influenced by just appreciation, undue praise or 
calumny, and is subject, it may be, to secular vicissi- 
tudes of good and evil fortune. 

"If this is not true, let us have no more talk about 
the immortalty of great men and women. The Sun- 
child was never weary of talking to us (as we then 
sometimes thought, a little tediously) about a great 
poet of that nation to which it pleased him to feign 
that he belonged. How plainly can we not now see 
that his words were spoken for our learning — for 
the enforcement of that true view of heaven and hell 
on which I am feebly trying to insist? The poet's 
name, he said, was Shakespeare. Whilst he was alive, 
very few people understood his greatness; whereas 



120 Erewhon Revisited 

now, after some three hundred years, he is deemed 
the greatest poet that the world has ever known. 'Can 
this man,' he asked, 'be said to have been truly born 
till many a long year after he had been reputed as 
truly dead? While he was in the flesh, was he more 
than a mere embryo growing towards birth into that 
life of the world to come in which he now shines so 
gloriously? What a small thing was that flesh and 
blood life, of which he was alone conscious, as com- 
pared with that fleshless life which he lives but knows 
not in the lives of millions, and which, had it ever 
been fully revealed even to his imagination, we may 
be sure that he could not have reached?' 

"These were the Sunchild's words, as repeated to 
me by one of his chosen friends while he was yet 
amongst us. Which, then, of this man's two lives 
should we deem best worth having, if we could choose 
one or the other, but not both? The felt or the un- 
felt? Who would not go cheerfully to block or stake 
if he knew that by doing so he could win such life 
as this poet lives, though he also knew that on having 
won it he could know no more about it? Does not 
this prove that in our heart of hearts we deem an 
unfelt life, in the heaven of men's loving thoughts, 
to be better worth having than any we can reasonably 
hope for and still feel ? 

"And the converse of this is true; many a man 
has unhesitatingly laid down his felt life to escape 
unfelt infamy in the hell of men's hatred and con- 
tempt. As body is the sacrament, or outward and 
visible sign, of mind, so is posterity the sacrament of 
those who live after death. Each is the mechanism 
througrh which the other becomes effective. 



Vicarious Existence 121 

*'I grant that many live but a short time when the 
breath is out of them. Few seeds germinate as com- 
pared with those that rot or are eaten, and most of 
this world's denizens are little more than still-born 
as regards the larger life, while none are immortal to 
the end of time. But the end of time is not worth con- 
sidering; not a few live as many centuries as either 
they or we need think about, and surely the world, so 
far as we can guess its object, was made rather to be 
enjoyed than to last. *Come and go' pervades all 
things of which we have knowledge, and if there was 
any provision made, it seems to have been for a short 
life and a merry one, with enough chance of exten- 
sion beyond the grave to be worth trying for, rather 
than for the perpetuity even of the best and noblest. 

"Granted, again, that few live after death as long 
or as fully as they had hoped to do, while many, when 
quick, can have had none but the faintest idea of the 
immortality that awaited them; it is nevertheless true 
that none are so still-born on -death as not to -enter 
into a life of some sort, however short and humble. 
A short life or a long one can no more be bargained 
for in the unseen world than in the 3een; as, how- 
ever, care on the part of parents can do much for the 
longer life and greater well-being of their offspring in 
this world, so the conduct of that offspring in this 
world does much both to secure for itself longer tenure 
of life in the next, and to determine whether that life 
shall be one of reward or punishment. 

" 'Reward or punishment,' some reader will perhaps 
exclaim; 'what mockery, when the essence of reward 
and punishment lies in their being felt by those who 
have earned them.' I can do nothing with those who 



122 Erewhon Revisited 

either cry for the moon, or deny that it has two sides, 
on the ground that we can see but one. Here comes 
in faith, of which the Sunchild said, that though we< 
can do Httle with it we can do nothing without it. 
Faith does not consist, as some have falsely urged, 
in believing things on insufficient evidence ; this is not 
faith, but faithlessness to all that we should hold most 
faithfully. Faith consists in holding that the instincts 
of the best men and women are in themselves an evi- 
dence which may not be set aside lightly ; and the best 
men and women have ever held that death is better 
than dishonour, and desirable if honour is to be won 
thereby. 

''It follows, then, that though our conscious flesh 
and blood life is the only one that we can fully ap- 
prehend, yet we do also indeed move, even here, in 
an unseen world, wherein, when our palpable life is 
ended, we shall continue to live for a shorter or longer 
time — reaping roughly though not infallibly, much as 
we have sown. Of this unseen world the best men 
and women will be almost as heedless while in the 
flesh as they will be when their life in flesh is over; 
for, as the Sunchild often said, 'The Kingdom of 
Heaven cometh not by observation.' It will be all in 
all to them, and at the same time nothing, for the 
better people they are, the less they will think of any- 
thing but this present life. 

"What an ineffable contradiction in terms have we 
not here. What a reversal, is it not, of all this world's 
canons, that we should hold even the best of all that 
we can know or feel in this life to be a poor thing as 
compared with hopes the fulfilment of which we can 
never either feel or know. Yet we all hold this, how- 



Vicarious Existence 123 

ever little we may admit it to ourselves. For the 
world at heart despises its own canons." 

I cannot quote further from Dr. Gurgoyle's pam- 
phlet; suffice it that he presently dealt with those who 
say that it is not right of any man to aim at thrusting 
himself in among the living when he has had his 
day. "Let him die," say they, "and let die as his 
fathers before him." He argued that as we had a 
right to pester people till we got ourselves born, so 
also we have a right to pester them for extension of 
life beyond the grave. Life, whether before the grave 
or afterwards, is like love — all reason is against it, 
and all healthy instinct for it. Instinct on such mat- 
ters is the older and safer guide; no one, therefore, 
should seek to efface himself as regards the next world 
more than as regards this. If he is to be effaced, let 
others efface him; do not let him commit suicide. 
Freely we have received ; freely, therefore, let us take 
as much more as we can get, and let it be a stand-up 
fight between ourselves and posterity to see whether 
it can get rid of us or no. If it can, let it; if it can- 
not, it must put up with us. It can better care for 
itself than we can for ourselves when the breath is 
out of us. 

Not the least important duty, he continued, of pos- 
terity towards itself lies in passing righteous judge- 
ment on the forbears who stand up before it. They 
should be allowed the benefit of a doubt, and pec- 
cadilloes should be ignored ; but when no doubt exists 
that a man was engrainedly mean and cowardly, his 
reputation must remain in the Purgatory of Time for 
a term varying from, say, a hundred to two thou- 
sand years. After a hundred years it may generally 



124 Erewhon Revisited 

come down, though it will still be under a cloud. After 
two thousand years it may be mentioned in any so- 
ciety without holding up of hands in horror. Our 
sense of moral guilt varies inversely as the square of 
its distance in time and space from ourselves. 

Not so with heroism; this loses no lustre through 
time and distance. Good is gold ; it is rare, but it will 
not tarnish. Evil is like dirty water — plentiful and 
foul, but it will run itself clear of taint. 

The Doctor having thus expatiated on his own opin- 
ions concerning heaven and hell, concluded by tilting 
at those which all right-minded people hold among 
ourselves. I shall adhere to my determination not to 
reproduce his arguments; suffice it that though less 
flippant than those of the young student whom I have 
already referred to, they were more plausible; and 
though I could easily demolish them, the reader will 
probably prefer that I should not set them up for the 
mere pleasure of knocking them down. Here, then, I 
take my leave of good Dr. Gurgoyle and his pamphlet; 
neither can I interrupt my story further by saying 
anything about the other two pamphlets purchased by 
my father. 



CHAPTER XII 

GEORGE FAILS TO FIND MY FATHER, WHEREON VRAM 
CAUTIONS THE PROFESSORS 

On the morning after the interview with her son 
described in a foregoing chapter, Yram told her hus- 
band what she had gathered from the Professors, and 
said that she was expecting Higgs every moment, in- 
asmuch as she was confident that George -would soon 
find him. 

*'Do you what you like, my dear," said the Mayor. 
"I shall keep out of the way, for you will manage him 
better without me. You know what I think of you." 

He then went unconcernedly to his breakfast at 
which the Professors found him somewhat tactitum. 
Indeed they set him down as one of the dullest and 
most uninteresting people they had ever met. 
^ When George returned and told his mother that 
though he had at last found the inn at which my father 
had slept, my father had left and could not be traced, 
she was disconcerted, but after a few minutes she 
said — 

"He will come back here for the dedication, but 
there will be such crowds that we may not see him till 
he is inside the temple, and it will save trouble if we 
can lay hold on him sooner. Therefore, ride either 
to Clearwater or Fairmead, and see if you can find 
him. Try Fairmead first; it is more out of the way. 

125 



126 Erewhon Revisited 

If you cannot hear of him there, come back, get an- 
other horse, and try Clearwater. If you fail here to, 
we must give him up, and look out for him in the 
temple to-morrow morning." 

"Are you going to say anything to the Professors?" 

"Not if you bring Higgs here before nightfall. If 
you cannot do this I must talk it over with my hus- 
band; I shall have some hours in which to make up 
my mind. Now go — the sooner the better." 

It was nearly eleven, and in a few minutes George 
was on his way. By noon he was at Fairmead, where 
he tried all the inns in vain for news of a person 
answering the description of my father — for, not 
knowing what name my father might choose to give, 
he could trust only to description. He concluded that 
since my father could not be heard of in Fairmead 
by one o'clock (as it nearly was by the time he had 
been round all the inns) he must have gone some- 
where else ; he therefore rode back to Sunch'ston, made 
a hasty lunch, got a fresh horse, and rode to Clear- 
water, where he met with no better success. At all 
the inns both at Fairmead and Clearwater he left word 
that if the person he had described came later in the 
day, he was to be told that the Mayoress particularly 
begged him to return at once to Sunch'ston, and come 
to the Mayor's house. 

Now all the time that George was at Fairmead my 
father was inside the Musical Bank, which he had en- 
tered before going to any inn. Here he had been sit- 
ting for nearly a couple of hours, resting, dreaming, 
and reading Bishop Gurgoyle's pamphlet. If he had 
left the Bank five minutes earlier, he would probably 
have been seen by George in the main street of Fair- 



A Vain Search 127 

mead — as he found out on reaching the inn which he 
selected and ordering dinner. 

He had hardly got inside the house before the waiter 
told him that young Mr. Strong, the Ranger from 
Sunch'ston, had been enquiring for him and had left 
a message for him, which was duly delivered. 

My father, though in reality somewhat disquieted, 
showed no uneasiness, and said how sorry he was to 
have missed seeing Mr. Strong. *'But," he added, 
*'it does not much matter ; I need not go back this af- 
ternoon, for I shall be at Sunch'ston to-morrow morn- 
ing and will go straight to the Mayor's." 

He had no suspicion that he was discovered, but he 
was a good deal puzzled. Presently he inclined to the 
opinion that George, still believing him to be Pro- 
fessor Panky, had wanted to invite him to the ban- 
quet on the following day — for he had no idea that 
Hanky and Panky were staying with the Mayor and 
Mayoress. Or perhaps the Mayor and his wife did 
not like so distinguished a man's having been unable 
to find a lodging in Sunch'ston, and wanted him to 
stay with them. Ill satisfied as he was with any theory 
he could form, he nevertheless reflected that he could 
not do better than stay where he was for the night, 
inasmuch as no one would be likely to look for him a 
second time at Fairmead. He therefore ordered his 
room at once. 

It was nearly seven before George got back to 
Sunch'ston. In the meantime Yram and the Mayor 
had considered the question whether anything was to 
be said to the Professors or no. They were confident 
that my father would not commit himself — why, in- 
deed, should he have dyed his hair and otherwise dis- 



128 Erewhon Revisited 

guised himself, if he had not intended to remain un- 
discovered? Oh no; the probabiHty was that if noth- 
ing was said to the Professors now, nothing need ever 
be said, for my father might be escorted back to the 
statues by George on the Sunday evening and be told 
that he was not to return. Moreover, even though 
something untoward were to happen after all, the 
Professors would have no reason for thinking that 
their hostess had known of the Sunchild's being in 
Sunch'ston. 

On the other hand, they were her guests, and it 
would not be handsome to keep Hanky, at any rate, 
in the dark, when the knowledge that the Sunchild 
was listening to every word he said might make him 
modify his sermon not a little. It might or it might 
not, but that was a matter for him, not her. The only 
question for her was whether or no it would be sharp 
practice to know what she knew and say nothing 
about it. Her husband hated finesse as much as she 
did, and they settled it that though the question was a 
nice one, the more proper thing to do would be to 
tell the Professors what it might so possibly concern 
one or both of them to know. 

On George's return without news of my father, they 
found he thought just as they did ; so it was arranged 
that they should let the Professors dine in peace, but 
tell them about the Sunchild's being again in Erewhon 
as soon as dinner was over. 

"Happily," said George, "they will do no harm. 
They will wish Higgs's presence to remain unknown 
as much as we do, and they will be glad that he should 
be got out of the country immediately." 

"Not so, my dear," said Yram. " *Out of the coun- 



A Vain Search 129 

try' will not do for those people. Nothing short of 
'out of the world' will satisfy them." 

'That," said George promptly, "must not be." 

"Certainly not, my dear, but that is what they will 
want. I do not like having to tell them, but I am 
afraid we must." 

"Never mind," said the Mayor, laughing. "Tell 
them, and let us see what happens." 

They then dressed for dinner, where Hanky and 
Panky were the only guests. When dinner was over 
Yram sent away her other children, George alone re- 
maining. He sat opposite the Professors, while the 
Mayor and Yram were at the two ends of the table. 

"I am afraid, dear Professor Hanky," said Yram, 
"that I was not quite open with you last night, but 
I wanted time to think things over, and I know you 
will forgive me when you remember what a number 
of guests I had to attend to." She then referred to 
what Hanky had told her about the supposed ranger, 
and shewed him how obvious it was that this man was 
a foreigner, who had been for some time in Erewhon 
more than seventeen years ago, but had had no com- 
munication with it since then. Having pointed suffi- 
ciently, as she thought, to the Sunchild, she said, "You 
see who I believe this man to have been. Have I said 
enough, or shall I say more?" 

"I understand you," said Hanky, "and I agree with 
you that the Sunchild will be in the temple to-mor- 
row. It is a serious business, but I shall not alter my 
sermon. He must listen to what I may choose to 
say, and I wish I could tell him what a fool he was for 
coming here. If he behaves himself, well and good: 
your son will arrest him quietly after service, and 



130 Erewhon Revisited 

by night he will be in the Blue Pool. Your son is 
bound to throw him there as a foreign devil, with- 
out the formality of a trial. It would be a most 
painful duty to me, but unless I am satisfied that that 
man has been thrown into the Blue Pool, I shall have 
no option but to report the matter at headquarters. 
If, on the other hand, the poor wretch makes a dis- 
turbance, I can set the crowd on to tear him to 
pieces." 

George was furious, but he remained quite calm, 
and left everything to his mother. 

"I have nothing to do with the Blue Pool," said 
Yram drily. ''My son, I doubt not, will know how 
to do his duty; but if you let the people kill this man, 
his body will remain, and an inquest must be held, 
for the matter will have been too notorious to be 
hushed up. All Higgs's measurements and all marks 
on his body were recorded, and these alone would 
identify him. My father, too, who is still master of 
the gaol, and many another, could swear to him. 
Should the body prove, as no doubt it would, to be that 
of the Sunchild, what is to become of Sunchildism ?" 

Hanky smiled. ''It would not be proved. The 
measurements of a man of twenty or thereabouts 
would not correspond with this man's. All we Pro- 
fessors should attend the inquest, and half Bridgeford 
is now in Sunch'ston. No matter though nine-tenths 
of the marks and measurements corresponded, so long 
as there is a tenth that does not do so, we should not 
be flesh and blood if we did not ignore the nine points 
and insist only on the tenth. After twenty years we 
shall find enough to serve our turn. Think of what 
all the learning of the country is committed to; think 



Yram Warns Hanky 131 

of the change in all our ideas and institutions; think 
of the King and of Court influence. I need not en- 
large. We shall not permit the body to be the Sun- 
child's. No matter what evidence you may produce, 
we shall sneer it down, and say we must have more 
before you can expect us to take you seriously; if you 
bring more, we shall pay no attention; and the more 
you bring the more we shall laugh at you. No doubt 
those among us who are by way of being candid will 
admit that your arguments ought to be considered, but 
you must not expect that it will be any part of their 
duty to consider them. 

''And even though we admitted that the body had 
been proved up to the hilt to be the Sunchild's, do you 
think that such a trifle as that could affect Sunchild- 
ism? Hardly. Sunch'ston is no match for Bridge- 
ford and the King; our only difficulty would lie in 
settling which was the most plausible way of the many 
plausible ways in which the death could be explained. 
We should hatch up twenty theories in less than twenty 
hours, and the last state of Sunchildism would be 
stronger than the first. For the people want it, and so 
long as they want it they will have it. At the same 
time the supposed identification of the body, even by 
some few ignorant people here, might lead to a local 
heresy that is as well avoided, and it will be better 
that your son should arrest the man before the dedica- 
tion, if he can be found, and throw him into the Blue 
Pool without any one but ourselves knowing that he 
has been here at all." 

I need not dwell on the deep disgust with which this 
speech was listened to, but the Mayor, and Yram, 
and George said not a word. 



132 Erewhon Revisited 

''But, Mayoress," said Panky, who had not opened 
his lips so far, ''are you sure that you are not too 
hasty in believing this stranger to be the Sunchild? 
People are continually thinking that such and such an- 
other is the Sunchild come down again from the sun's 
palace and going to and fro among us. How many 
such stories, sometimes very plausibly told, have we 
not had during the last twenty years? They never 
take root, and die out of themselves as suddenly as 
they spring up. That the man is a poacher can hardly 
be doubted ; I thought so the moment I saw him ; but 
I think I can also prove to you that he is not a for- 
eigner, and, therefore, that he is not the Sunchild. He 
quoted the Sunchild's prayer with a corruption that 
can have only reached him from an Erewhonian 
source " 

Here Hanky interrupted him somewhat brusquely. 

"The man, Panky," said he, "was the Sunchild; and 
he was not a poacher, for he had no idea that he was 
breaking the law; nevertheless, as you say, Sunchild- 
ism on the brain has been a common form of mania 
for several years. Several persons have even believed 
themselves to be the Sunchild. We must not forget 
this, if it should get about that Higgs has been here." 

Then, turning to Yram, he said sternly, "But come 
what may, your son must take him to the Blue Pool 
at nightfall." 

"Sir," said George, with perfect suavity, "you have 
spoken as though you doubted my readiness to do 
my duty. Let me assure you very solemnly that when 
the time comes for me to act, I shall act as duty may 
direct." 



Yram Warns Hanky 133 

"I will answer for him," said Yram, with even more 
than her usual quick, frank smile, ''that he will fulfil 
his instructions to the letter, unless," she added, "some 
black and white horses come down from heaven and 
snatch poor Higgs out of his grasp. Such things have 
happened before now." 

'*! should advise your son to shoot them if they do," 
said Hanky drily and sub-defiantly. 

Here the conversation closed ; but it was useless 
trying to talk of anything else, so the Professors asked 
Yram to excuse them if they retired early, in view 
of the fact that they had a fatiguing day before them. 
This excuse their hostess readily acepted. 

"Do not let us talk any more now," said Yram as 
soon as they had left the room. "It will be quite time 
enough when the dedication is over. But I rather 
think the black and white horses will come." 

"I think so too, my dear," said the Mayor laugh- 
ing. 

"They shall come," said George gravely; "but we 
have not yet got enough to make sure of bringing 
them. Higgs will perhaps be able to help me to- 



"Now what," said Panky as they w^ent upstairs, 
"does that woman mean — for she means something? 
Black and white horses indeed !" 

"I do not know what she means to do," said the 
other, "but I know that she thinks she can best us." 

"I wish we had not eaten those quails." 

"Nonsense, Panky; no one saw us but Higgs, and 
the evidence of a foreign devil, in such straits as his, 



134 Erewhon Revisited 

could not stand for a moment. We did not eat them. 
No, no ; she has something that she thinks better than 
that. Besides, it is absolutely impossible that she should 
have heard what happened. What I do not under- 
stand is, why she should have told us about the Sun- 
child's being here at all. Why not have left us to 
find it out or to know nothing about it? I do not 
understand it." 

So true is it, as Euclid long since observed, that the 
less cannot comprehend that which is the greater. 
True, however, as this is, it is also sometimes true that 
the greater cannot comprehend the less. Hanky went 
musing to his own room and threw himself into an 
easy chair to think the position over. After a few 
minutes he went to a table on which he saw pen, ink, 
and paper, and wrote a short letter; then he rang 
the bell. 

When the servant came he said, **I want to send this 
note to the manager of the new temple, and it is im- 
portant that he should have it to-night. Be pleased, 
therefore, to take it to him and deliver it into his own 
hands ; but I had rather you said nothing about it to 
the Mayor or Mayoress, nor to any of your fellow- 
servants. Slip out unperceived if you can. When 
you have delivered the note, ask for an answer at 
once, and bring it to me." 

So saying, he slipped a sum equal to about five shill- 
ings into the man's hand. 

The servant returned in about twenty minutes, for 
the temple was quite near, and gave a note to Hanky, 
which ran, *'Your wishes shall be attended to without 
fail." 



Yram Warns Hanky I35 

''Good!" said Hanky to the man. ''No one in the 
house knows of your having run this errand for me?" 
"No one, sir." 
'Thank you ! I wish you a very good night." 



CHAPTER XIII 

A VISIT TO THE PROVINCIAL DEFORM ATORY 
AT FAIRMEAD 

Having finished his early dinner, and not fearing 
that he should be either recognised at Fairmead or 
again enquired after from Sunch'ston, my father went 
out for a stroll round the town, to see what else he 
could find that should be new and strange to him. He 
had not gone far before he saw a large building with 
an inscription saying that it was the Provincial De- 
formatory for Boys. Underneath the larger inscrip- 
tion there was a smaller one — one of those corrupt 
versions of my father's sayings, which, on dipping 
into the Sayings of the Sunchild, he had found to be 
so vexatiously common. The inscription ran: — 

"When the righteous man turneth away from the right- 
eousness that he hath committed, .and doeth that which is a 
little naughty and wrong, he will generally be found to have 
gained in amiability what he has lost in righteousness." — 
Sunchild Sayings, chap. xxii. v. 15. 

The case of the little girl that he had watched earlier 
in the day had filled him with a great desire to see the 
working of one of these curious institutions ; he there- 
fore resolved to call on the head-master (whose name 
he found to be Turvey), and enquired about terms, 
alleging that he had a boy whose incorrigible rectitude 

136 



A Deformatory 137 

was giving him much anxiety. The information he 
had gained in the forenoon would be enough to save 
him from appearing to know nothing of the system. 
On having rung the bell, he announced himself to the 
servant as a Mr. Senoj, and asked if he could see the 
Principal. 

Almost immediately he was ushered into the pres- 
ence of a beaming, dapper-looking, little old gentle- 
man, quick of speech and movement, in spite of some 
little portliness. 

'Ts, ts, ts," he said, when my father had enquired 
about terms and asked whether he might see the sys- 
tem at work. *'How unfortunate that you should have 
called on a Saturday afternoon. We always have a 
half -holiday. But stay — yes — that will do very 
nicely ; I will send for them into school as a means of 
stimulating their refractory system." 

He called his servant and told him to ring the boys 
into school. Then, turning to my father he said, 
"Stand here, sir, by the window ; you will see them all 
come trooping in. H'm, h'm, I am sorry to see them 
still come back as soon as they hear the bell. I sup- 
pose I shall ding some recalcitrancy into them some 
day, but it is uphill work. Do you see the head-boy — 
the third of those that are coming up the path? I 
shall have to get rid of him. Do you see him? he is 
going back to whip up the laggers — and now he has 
boxed a boy's ears : that boy is one of the most hope- 
ful under my care. I feel sure he has been using im- 
proper language, and my head-boy has checked him 
instead of encouraging him." And so on till the boys 
were all in school. 

"You see, my dear sir," he said to my father, "we 



138 Erewhon Revisited 

are in an impossible position. We have to obey in- 
structions from the Grand Council of Education at 
Bridgeford, and they have established these institu- 
tions in consequence of the Sunchild's having said that 
we should aim at promoting the greatest happiness of 
the greatest number. This, no doubt, is a sound prin- 
ciple, and the greatest number are by nature somewhat 
dull, conceited, and unscrupulous. They do not like 
those who are quick, unassuming, and sincere; how, 
then, consistently with the first principles either of 
morality or political economy as revealed to us by the 
Sunchild, can we encourage such people if we can 
bring sincerity and modesty fairly home to them ? We 
cannot do so. And we must correct the young as far 
as possible from forming habits which, unless indulged 
in with the greatest moderation, are sure to ruin them. 
"I cannot pretend to consider myself very success- 
ful. I do my best, but I can only aim at making my 
school a reflection of the outside world. In the out- 
side world we have to tolerate much that is prejudicial 
to the greatest happiness of the greatest number, 
partly because we cannot always discover in time who 
may be let alone as being genuinely insincere, and who 
are in reality masking sincerity under a garb of flip- 
pancy, and partly also because we wish to err on the 
side of letting the guilty escape, rather than of pun- 
ishing the innocent. Thus many people who are per- 
fectly well known to belong to the straightforward 
classes are allowed to remain at large, and may be 
even seen hobnobbing with the guardians of public 
immorality. Indeed it is not in the public interest that 
straightforwardness should be extirpated root and 
branch, for the presence of a small modicum of sin- 



A Deformatory 139 

cerity acts as a wholesome irritant to the academi- 
cism of the greatest number, stimulating it to con- 
sciousness of its own happy state, and giving it 
something to look down upon. Moreover, we hold 
it useful to have a certain number of melancholy ex- 
amples, whose notorious failure shall serve as a warn- 
ing to those who neglect cultivating that power of im- 
moral self-control which shall prevent them from say- 
ing, or even thinking, anything that shall not imme- 
diately and palpably minister to the happiness, and 
hence meet the approval, of the greatest number." 

By this time the boys were all in school. ^'There is 
not one prig in the whole lot," said the head-master 
sadly. "I wish there was, but only those boys come 
here who are notoriously too good to become current 
coin in the world unless they are hardened with an 
alloy of vice. I should have liked to show you our 
gambling, book-making, and speculation class, but the 
assistant-master who attends to this branch of our 
curriculum is gone to Sunch'ston this afternoon. He 
has friends who have asked him to see the dedication 
of the new temple, and he will not be back till Mon- 
day. I really do not know what I can do better for 
you than examine the boys in Counsels of Imperfec- 
tion." 

So saying, he went into the schoolroom, over the 
fireplace of which my father's eye caught an inscrip- 
tion, "Resist good, and it will fly from you. Sun- 
child's Sayings, xvii. 2." Then, taking down a copy 
of the work just named from a shelf above his desk, 
he ran his eye over a few of its pages. 

He called up a class of about twenty boys. 



140 Erewhon Revisited 

"Now, my boys," he said, "why is it so necessary to 
avoid extremes of truthfulness?" 

"It is not necessary, sir," said one youngster, "and 
the man who says that it is so is a scoundrel." 

"Come here, my boy, and hold out your hand." 
When he had done so, Mr. Turvey gave him two sharp 
cuts with a cane. "There now, go down to the bottom 
of the class and try not to be so extremely truthful in 
future." Then, turning to my father, he said, "I hate 
caning them, but it is the only way to teach them. I 
really do believe that boy will know better than to say 
what he thinks another time." 

He repeated his question to the class, and the head- 
boy answered, "Because, sir, extremes meet, and ex- 
treme truth will be mixed with extreme falsehood." 

"Quite right, my boy. Truth is like religion; it has 
only two enemies — the too much and the too little. 
Your answer is more satisfactory than some of your 
recent conduct had led me to expect." 

"But, sir, you punished me only three weeks ago for 
telling you a lie." 

"Oh yes ; why, so I did ; I had forgotten. But then 
you overdid it. Still it was a step in the right direc- 
tion." 

"And now, my boy," he said to a very frank and in- 
genious youth about half way up the class, "and how is 
truth best reached?" 

"Through the falling out of thieves, sir." 

"Quite so. Then it will be necessary that the more 
earnest, careful, patient, self-sacrificing enquirers 
after truth should have a good deal of the thief about 
them, though they are very honest people at the same 
time. Now what does the man" (who on enquiry my 



A Deformatory 141 

father found to be none other than Mr. Turvey him- 
self) "say about honesty?" 

**He says, sir, that honesty does not consist in never 
stealing, but in knowing how and where it will be safe 
to do so." 

"Remember," said Mr. Turvey to my father, "how 
necessary it is that we should have a plentiful supply 
of thieves, if honest men are ever to come by their 
own." 

He spoke with the utmost gravity, evidently quite 
easy in his mind that his scheme was the only one by 
which truth could be successfully attained. "But pray 
let me have any criticism you may feel inclined to 
make." 

"I have none," said my father, "Your system com- 
mends itself to common sense; it is the one adopted in 
the law courts, and it lies at the very foundation of 
party government. If your academic bodies can sup- 
ply the country with a sufficient number of thieves — 
which I have no doubt they can — there seems no limit 
to the amount of truth that may be attained. If, how- 
ever, I may suggest the only difficulty that occurs to 
me, it is that academic thieves shew no great alacrity 
in falling out, but incline rather to back each other up 
through thick and thin." 

"Ah, yes," said Mr. Turvey, "there is that diffi- 
culty; nevertheless circumstances from time to time 
arise to get them by the ears in spite of themselves. 
But from whatever point of view you may look at the 
question, it is obviously better to aim at imperfection 
than perfection ; for if we aim steadily at imperfection, 
we shall probably get it within a reasonable time, 
whereas to the end of our days we should never reach 



142 Erewhon Revisited 

perfection. Moreover, from a worldly point of view, 
there is no mistake so great as that of being always 
right." He then turned to his class and said — 

"And now tell me what did the Sunchild tell us 
about God and Mammon?" 

The head-boy answered: "He said that we must 
serve both, for no man can serve God well and truly 
who does not serve Mammon a little also ; and no man 
can serve Mammon effectually unless he serve God 
largely at the same time." 

"What were his words ?" 

"He said, 'Cursed be they that say, "Thou shalt 
not serve God and Mammon," for it is the whole duty 
of man to know how to adjust the conflicting claims 
of these two deities.' " 

Here my father interposed. "I knew the Sunchild; 
and I more than once heard him speak of God and 
Mammon. He never varied the form of the words he 
used, which were to the effect that a man must serve 
either God or Mammon, but that he could not serve 
both." 

"Ah!" said Mr. Turvey, "that no doubt was his 
exoteric teaching, but Professors Hanky and Panky 
have assured me most solemnly that his esoteric teach- 
ing was as I have given it. By the way, these gentle- 
men are both, I understand, at Sunch'ston, and I think 
it quite likely that I shall have a visit from them this 
afternoon, li you do not know them I should have 
great pleasure in introducing you to them; I was at 
Bridgeford with both of them." 

"I have had the pleasure of meeting them already," 
said my father, "and as you are by no means certain 
that they will come, I will ask you to let me thank you 



A Deformatory 143 

for all that you have been good enough to shew me, 
and bid you good-afternoon. I have a rather press- 
ing engagement " 

''My dear sir, you must please give me five min- 
utes more. I shall examine the boys in the Musical 
Bank Catechism." He pointed to one of them, and 
said, ''Repeat your duty towards your neighbour." 

"My duty towards my neighbour," said the boy, 
"is to be quite sure that he is not likely to borrow 
money of me before I let him speak to me at all, and 
then to have as little to do with him as " 

At this point there was a loud ring at the door bell. 
"Hanky and Panky come to see me, no doubt," said 
Mr. Turvey. "I do hope it is so. You must stay and 
see them." 

"My dear sir," said my father, putting his handker- 
chief up to his face, "I am taken suddenly unwell and 
must positively leave you." He said this in so per- 
emptory a tone that Mr. Turvey had to yield. My 
father held his handkerchief to his face as he went 
through the passage and hall, but when the servant 
opened the door he took it down, for there was no 
Hanky or Panky — no one, in fact, but a poor, wizened 
old man who had come, as he did every other Satur- 
day afternoon, to wind up the Deformatory clocks. 

Nevertheless, he had been scared, and was in a very 
wicked-fleeth-when-no-man-pursueth frame of mind. 
He went to his inn, and shut himself up in his room 
for some time, taking notes of all that had happened 
to him in the last three days. But even at his inn he no 
longer felt safe. How did he know but that Hanky 
and Panky might have driven over from Sunch^ston to 



144 Erewhon Revisited 

see Mr. Turvey, and might put up at this very house? 
or they might even be going to spend the night here. 
He did not venture out of his room till after seven, by 
which time he had made rough notes of as much of the 
foregoing chapters as had come to his knowledge so 
far. Much of what I have told as nearly as I could in 
the order in which it happened, he did not learn till 
later. After giving the merest outline of his interview 
with Mr. Turvey, he wrote a note as follows : — 

"I suppose I must have held forth about the greatest 
happiness of the greatest number, but I had quite for- 
gotten it, though I remember repeatedly quoting my 
favourite proverb, 'Every man for himself, and the 
devil take the hindmost.' To this they have paid no 
attention." 

By seven his panic about Hanky and Panky ended, 
for if they had not come by this time, they were not 
likely to do so. Not knowing that they were staying 
at the Mayor's, he had rather settled it that they would 
now stroll up to the place where they had left their 
hoard and bring it down as soon as night had fallen. 
And it is quite possible that they might have found 
some excuse for doing this, when dinner was over, if 
their hostess had not undesignedly hindered them by 
telling them about the Sunchild. When the conversa- 
tion recorded in the preceding chapter was over, it was 
too late for them to make any plausible excuse for 
leaving the house; we may be sure, therefore, that 
much more had been said than Yram and George were 
able to remember and report to my father. 

After another stroll about Fairmead, during which 
he saw nothing but what on a larger scale he had 



A Deformatory 145 

already seen at Sunch'ston, he returned to his inn at 
about half -past eight, and ordered supper in a public 
room that corresponded with the coffee-room of an 
English hotel. 



CHAPTER XIV 

my father makes the acquaintance of mr. 
balm'y, and walks with him neixt day to 
sunch'ston 

Up to this point, though he had seen enough to 
shew him the main drift of the great changes that had 
taken place in Erewhonian opinions, my father had 
not been able to glean much about the history of the 
transformation. He could see that it had all grown 
out of the supposed miracle of his balloon ascent, and 
he could understand that the ignorant masses had been 
so astounded by an event so contrary to all their ex- 
perience, that their faith in experience was utterly 
routed and demoralised. If a man and a woman might 
rise from the earth and disappear into the sky, what 
else might not happen? If they had been wrong in 
thinking such a thing impossible, in how much else 
might they not be mistaken also? The ground was 
shaken under their very feet. 

It was not as though the thing had been done in a 
corner. Hundreds of people had seen the ascent; and 
even if only a small number had been present, the dis- 
appearance of the balloon, of my mother, and of my 
father himself, would have confirmed their story. My 
father, then, could understand that a single incontro- 
vertible miracle of the first magnitude should unroot 
the hedges of caution in the minds of the common 

146 



Mr. Balmy 147 

people, but he could not understand how such men as 
Hanky and Panky, who evidently did not believe that 
there had been any miracle at all, had been led to throw 
themselves so energetically into a movement so sub- 
versive of all their traditions, when, as it seemed to 
him, if they had held out they might have pricked the 
balloon bubble easily enough, and maintained every- 
thing in statu quo. 

How, again, had they converted the King — if they 
had converted him? The Queen had had full knowl- 
edge of all the preparations for the ascent. The King 
had had everything explained to him. The workmen 
and workwomen who had made the balloon and the gas 
could testify that none but natural means had been 
made use of — means which, if again employed any 
number of times, would effect a like result. How 
could it be that when the means of resistance were so 
ample and so easy, the movement should nevertheless 
have been irresistible ? For had it not been irresistible, 
was it to be believed that astute men like Hanky and 
Panky would have let themselves be drawn into it? 

What then had been its inner history? My father 
had so fully determined to make his way back on the 
following evening, that he saw no chance of getting to 
know the facts — unless, indeed, he should be able to 
learn something from Hanky's sermon ; he was there- 
fore not sorry to find an elderly gentleman of grave 
but kindly aspect seated opposite to him when he sat 
down to supper. 

The expression on this man's face was much like 
that of the early Christians as shewn in the S. Giovanni 
Laterano bas-reliefs at Rome, and again, though less 
aggressively self-confident, like that on the faces of 



148 Erewhon Revisited 

those who have joined the Salvation Army. If he haH! 
been in England, my father would have set him down 
as a Swedenborgian ; this being impossible, he could 
only note that the stranger bowed his head, evidently 
saying a short grace before he began to eat, as my 
father had always done when he was in Erewhon be- 
fore. I will not say that my father had never omitted 
to say grace during the whole of the last twenty years, 
but he said it now, and unfortunately forgetting him- 
self, he said it in the English language, not loud, but 
nevertheless audibly. 

My father was alarmed at what he had done, but 
there was no need, for the stranger immediately said, 
"I hear, sir, that you have the gift of tongues. The 
Sunchild often mentioned it to us, as having been 
vouchsafed long since to certain of the people, to 
whom, for our learning, he saw fit to feign that he be- 
longed. Ele thus foreshadowed prophetically its mani- 
festation also among ourselves. All which, however, 
you must know as well as I do. Can you interpret?" 

My father was much shocked, but he remembered 
having frequently spoken of the power of speaking in 
unknown tongues which was possessed by many of the 
early Christians, and he also remembered that in times 
of high religious enthusiasm this power had repeatedly 
been imparted, or supposed to be imparted, to devout 
believers in the middle ages. It grated upon him to 
deceive one who was so obviously sincere, but to avoid 
immediate discomfiture he fell in with what the 
stranger had said. 

"Alas ! sir," said he, "that rarer and more precious 
gift has been withheld from me ; nor can I speak in an 
unknown tongue, unless as it is borne in upon me at 



Mr. Balmy 149 

the moment. I could not even repeat the words that 
have just fallen from me." 

'That," replied the stranger, "is almost invariably 
the case. These illuminations of the spirit are beyond 
human control. You spoke in so low a tone that I 
cannot interpret what you have just said, but should 
you receive a second inspiration later, I shall doubt- 
less be able to interpret it for you. I have been sin- 
gularly gifted in this respect — more so, perhaps, than 
any other interpreter in Erewhon." 

My father mentally vowed that no second inspira- 
tion should be vouchsafed to him, but presently re- 
membering how anxious he was for information on the 
points touched upon at the beginning of this chapter, 
and seeing that fortune had sent him the kind of man 
who would be able to enlighten him, he changed his 
mind; nothing, he reflected, would be more likely to 
make the stranger talk freely with him, than the afford- 
ing him an opportunity for showing off his skill as an 
interpreter. 

Something, therefore, he would say, but what? No 
one could talk more freely when the train of his 
thoughts, or the conversation of others, gave him his 
cue, but when told to say an unattached "something," 
he could not even think of "How do you do this morn- 
ing ? it is a very fine day" ; and the more he cudgelled 
his brains for "something" the more they gave no re- 
sponse. He could not even converse further with the 
stranger beyond plain "yes" and "no" ; so he went on 
with his supper, and in thinking of what he was eating 
and drinking for the moment forgot to ransack his 
brain. No sooner had he left off ransacking it, than 
it suggested something — not, indeed, a very brilliant 



150 Erewhon Revisited 

something, but still something. On having grasped it, 
he laid down his knife and fork, and with the air of 
one distraught he said — 

"My name is Nerval, on the Grampian Hills 
My father feeds his flock — a frugal swain." 

"I heard you," exclaimed the stranger, *'and I can 
interpret every word of what you have said, but it 
would not become me to do so, for you have con- 
veyed to me a message more comforting than I can 
bring myself to repeat even to him who has conveyed 
it." 

Having said this he bowed his head, and remained 
for some time wrapped in meditation. My father kept 
a respectful silence, but after a little time he ventured 
to say in a low tone, how glad he was to have been 
the medium through whom a comforting assurance 
had been conve3^ed. Presently, on finding himself en- 
couraged to renew the conversation, he threw out a 
deferential feeler as to the causes that might have in- 
duced Mr. Balmy to come to Fairmead. "Perhaps," 
he said, *'you, like myself, have come to these parts in 
order to see the dedication of the new temple; I could 
not get a lodging in Sunch'ston, so I walked down here 
this morning." 

This, it seemed, had been Mr. Balmy's own case, ex- 
cept that he had not yet been to Sunch'ston. Having 
heard that it was full to overflowing, he had deter- 
mined to pass the night at Fairmead, and walk over in 
the morning — starting soon after seven, so as to ar- 
rive in good time for the dedication ceremony. When 
my father heard this, he proposed that they should 
walk together, to which Mr. Balmy gladly consented; 



Mr. Balmy 151 

it was therefore arranged that they should go to bed 
early, breakfast soon after six, and then walk to 
Sunch'ston. My father then went to his own room, 
where he again smoked a surreptitious pipe up the 
chimney. 

Next morning the two men breakfasted together, 
and set out as the clock was striking seven. The day 
was lovely beyond the power of words, and still fresh 
— for Fairmead was some 2500 feet above the sea, and 
the sun did not get above the mountains that overhung 
it on the east side, till after eight o'clock. Many per- 
sons were also starting for Sunch'ston, and there was 
a procession got up by the Musical Bank Managers of 
the town, who walked in it, robed in rich dresses of 
scarlet and white embroidered with much gold thread. 
There was a banner displaying an open chariot in 
which the Sunchild and his bride were seated, beaming 
with smiles, and in attitudes suggesting that they were 
bowing to people who were below them. The chariot 
was, of course, drawn by the four black and white 
horses of which the reader has already heard, and the 
balloon had been ignored. Readers of my father's 
book will perhaps remember that my mother was not 
seen at all — she was smuggled into the car of the bal- 
loon along with sundry rugs, under which she lay con- 
cealed till the balloon had left the earth. All this went 
for nothing. It has been said that though God cannot 
alter the past, historians can ; it is perhaps because they 
can be useful to Him in this respect that He tolerates 
their existence. Painters, my father now realised, can 
do all that historians can, with even greater effect. 

Women headed the procession — the younger ones 
dressed in white, with veils and chaplets of roses, blue 



152 Erewhon Revisited 

cornflower, and peasant's eye Narcissus, while the 
older women were more soberly attired. The Bank 
Managers and the banner headed the men, who were 
mostly peasants, but among them were a few who 
seemed to be of higher rank, and these, for the most 
part, though by no means all of them, wore their clothes 
reversed — as I have forgotten to say was done also by 
Mr. Balmy. Both men and women joined in singing 
a litany the words of which my father could not catch; 
the tune was one he had been used to play on his 
apology for a flute when he was in prison, being, in fact, 
none other than ''Home, Sweet Home." There was 
no harmony ; they never got beyond the first four bars, 
but these they must have repeated, my father thought, 
at least a hundred times between Fairmead and Sunch'- 
ston. ''Well," said he to himself, ^'however little else 
I may have taught them, I at any rate gave them the 
diatonic scale." 

He now set himself to exploit his fellow-traveller, 
for they soon got past the procession. 

"The greatest miracle," said he, *'in connection 
with this whole matter, has been — so at least it seems 
to me — not the ascent of the Sunchild with his bride, 
but the readiness with which the people generally ac- 
knowledge its miraculous character. I was one of 
those that witnessed the ascent, but I saw no signs that 
the crowd appreciated its significance. They were 
astounded, but they did not fall down and worship." 

"Ah," said the other, "but you forget the long 
drought and the rain that the Sunchild immediately 
prevailed on the air-god to send us. He had an- 
nounced himself as about to procure it for us; it was 
on this ground that the King assented to the prepara- 



Mr. Balmy 153 

tion of those material means that were necessary be- 
fore the horses of the sun could attach themselves to 
the chariot into which the balloon was immediately 
transformed. Those horses might not be defiled by 
contact with this gross earth. I too witnessed the as- 
cent ; at the moment, I grant you, I saw neither chariot 
nor horses, and almost all those present shared my 
own temporary blindness ; the whole action from the 
moment when the balloon left the earth, moved so rap- 
idly, that we were flustered, and hardly knew what it 
was that we were really seeing. It was not till two or 
three years later that I found the scene presenting 
itself to my soul's imaginary sight in the full splendour 
which was no doubt witnessed, but not apprehended, 
by my bodily vision." 

"There," said my father, **you confirm an opinion 
that I have long held. — Nothing is so misleading as 
the testimony of eye-witnesses." 

*'A spiritual enlightenment from within," returned 
Mr. Balmy, ''is more to be relied on than any merely 
physical affluence from external objects. Now, when 
I shut my eyes, I see the balloon ascend a little way, 
but almost immediately the heavens open, the horses 
descend, the balloon is transformed, and the glorious 
pageant careers onward till it vanishes into the heaven 
of heavens. Hundreds with whom I have conversed 
assure me that their experience has been the same as 
mine. Has yours been different?" 

''Oh no, not at all; but I always see some storks 
circling round the balloon before I see any horses." 

"How strange! I have heard others also say that 
they saw the storks you mention; but let me do my 
utmost I cannot force them into my mental image of 



154 Erewhon Revisited 

the scene. This shows, as you were saying just now, 
how incomplete the testimony of an eye-witness often 
is. It is quite possible that the storks were there, but 
the horses and the chariot have impressed themselves 
more vividly on my mind than anything else has/' 

"Quite so ; and I am not without hope that even at 
this late hour some further details may yet be revealed 
to us." 

*'It is possible, but we should be as cautious in ac- 
cepting any fresh details as in rejecting them. Should 
some heresy obtain wide acceptance, visions will per- 
haps be granted to us that may be useful in refuting 
it, but otherwise I expect nothing more." 

"Neither do I, but I have heard people say that in- 
asmuch as the Sunchild said he was going to interview 
the air-god in order to send us rain, he was more prob- 
ably son to the air-god than to the sun. Now here is a 
heresy which " 

"But, my dear sir," said Mr. Balmy, interrupting 
him with great warmth, "he spoke of his father in 
heaven as endowed with attributes far exceeding any 
that can be conceivably ascribed to the air-god. The 
power of the air-god does not extend beyond our own 
atmosphere." 

"Pray believe me," said my father, who saw by the 
ecstatic gleam in his companion's eye that there was 
nothing to be done but to agree with him, "that I ac- 
cept " 

"Hear me to the end," replied Mr. Balmy. "Who 
ever heard the Sunchild claim relationship with the air- 
god? He could command the air-god, and evidently 
did so, halting no doubt for this beneficent purpose on 
his journey towards his ultimate destination. Can we 



Mr. Balmy 155 

suppose that the air-god, who had evidently intended 
withholding the rain from us for an indefinite period, 
should have so immediately relinquished his designs 
against us at the intervention of any less exalted per- 
sonage than the sun's own offspring? Impossible!" 

*1 quite agree with you," exclaimed my father, "it 
is out of the " 

"Let me finish what I have to say. When the rain 
came so copiously for days, even those who had not 
seen the miraculous ascent found its consequences 
come so directly home to them, that they had no diffi- 
culty in accepting the report of others. There was not 
a farmer or cottager in the land but heaved a sigh of 
relief at rescue from impending ruin, and they all 
knew it was the Sunchild who had promised the King 
that he would make the air-god send it. So abun- 
dantly, you will remember, did it come, that we had to 
pray to him to stop it, which in his own good time he 
was pleased to do." 

"I remember," said my father, who was at last able 
to edge in a word, "that it nearly flooded me out of 
house and home. And yet, in spite of all this, I hear 
that there are many at Bridgeford who are still hard- 
ened unbelievers." 

"Alas! you speak too truly. Bridgeford and the 
Musical Banks for the first three years fought tooth 
and nail to blind those whom it was their first duty to 
enlighten. I was a Professor of the hypothetical lan- 
guage, and you may perhaps remember how I was 
driven from my chair on account of the fearlessness 
with which I expounded the deeper mysteries of Sun- 
childism." 



156 Erewhon Revisited 

"Yes, I remember well how cruelly " but my 

father was not allowed to get beyond "cruelly." 

"It was I who explained why the Sunchild had rep- 
resented himself as belonging to a people in many 
respects analogous to our own, when no such people 
can have existed. It was I who detected that the sup- 
posed nation spoken of by the Sunchild was an inven- 
tion designed in order to give us instruction by the 
light of which we might more easily remodel our in- 
stitutions. I have sometimes thought that my gift of 
interpretation was vouchsafed to me in recognition of 
the humble services that I was hereby allowed to ren- 
der. By the way, you have received no illumination 
this morning, have you?" 

"I never do, sir, when I am in the company of one 
whose conversation I find supremely interesting. But 
you were telling me about Bridgeford : I live hundreds 
of miles from Bridgeford, and have never understood 
the suddenness, and completeness, with which men 
like Professors Hanky and Panky and Dr. Downie 
changed front. Do they believe as you and I do, or 
did they merely go with the times? I spent a couple 
of hours with Hanky and Panky only two evenings 
ago, and was not so much impressed as I could have 
wished with the depth of their religious fervour." 

"They are sincere now — more especially Hanky — 
but I cannot think I am judging them harshly, if I 
say that they were not so at first. Even now, I fear, 
that they are more carnally than spiritually minded. 
See how they have fought for the aggrandisement of 
their own order. It is mainly their doing that the 
Musical Banks have usurped the spiritual authority 
formerly exercised by the straighteners." 



Mr. Balmy 157 

"But the straighteners," said my father, "could not 
co-exist with Sunchildism, and it is hard to see how 
the claims of the Banks can be reasonably gainsaid." 

"Perhaps ; and after all the Banks are our main bul- 
wark against the evils that I fear will follow from the 
repeal of the laws against machinery. This has 
already led to the development of a materialism which 
minimizes the miraculous element in the Sunchild^s 
ascent, as our own people minimize the material means 
that were the necessary prologue to the miraculous." 

Thus did they converse ; but I will not pursue their 
conversation further. It will be enough to say that in 
further floods of talk Mr. Balmy confirmed what 
George had said about the Banks having lost their hold 
upon the masses. That hold was weak even in the 
time of my father's first visit ; but when the people saw 
the hostility of the Banks to a movement which far the 
greater number of them accepted, it seemed as though 
both Bridgeford and the Banks were doomed, for 
Bridgeford was heart and soul with the Banks. 
Hanky, it appeared, though tmder thirty, and not yet 
a Professor, grasped the situation, and saw that 
Bridgeford must either move with the times, or go. 
He consulted some of the most sagacious Heads of 
Houses and Professors, with the result that a com- 
mittee of enquiry was appointed, which in due course 
reported that the evidence for the Sunchild's having 
been the only child of the sun was conclusive. It was 
about this time — that is to say some three years after 
his ascent — that "Higgism," as it had been hitherto 
been called, became "Sunchildism," and "Higgs" the 
"Sunchild." 

My father also learned the King's fury at his escape 



158 Erewhon Revisited 

(for he would call it nothing else) with my mother. 
This was so great that though he had hitherto been, 
and had ever since proved himself to be, a humane 
ruler, he ordered the instant execution of all who had 
been concerned in making either the gas or the balloon ; 
and his cruel orders were carried out within a couple 
of hours. At the same time he ordered the destruction 
by fire of the Queen's workshops, and of all remnants 
of any materials used in making the balloon. It is said 
the Queen was so much grieved and outraged (for it 
was her doing that the material groundwork, so to 
speak, had been provided for the miracle) that she 
wept night and day without ceasing three whole 
months, and never again allowed her husband to em- 
brace her, till he had also embraced Sunchildism. 

When the rain came, public indignation at the 
King's action was raised almost to revolution pitch, 
and the King was frightened at once by the arrival of 
the promised downfall and the displeasure of his sub- 
jects. But he still held out, and it was only after con- 
cessions on the part of the Bridgeford committee, that 
he at last consented to the absorption of Sunchildism 
into the Musical Bank system, and to its establish- 
ment as the religion of the country. The far-reaching 
changes in Erewhonian institutions with which the 
reader is already acquainted followed as a matter of 
course. 

'T know the difficulty," said my father presently, 
*Vith which the King was persuaded to allow the way 
in which the Sunchild's dress should be worn to be a 
matter of opinion, not dogma. I see we have adopted 
different fashions. Have you any decided opinions 
upon the subject?" 



Mr. Balmy 159 

"I have ; but I will ask you not to press me for them. 
Let this matter remain as the King has left it." 

My father thought that he might now venture on a 
shot. So he said, "I have always understood, too, that 
the King forced the repeal of the laws against ma- 
chinery on the Bridgeford committee, as another con- 
dition of his assent?" 

"Certainly. He insisted on this, partly to gratify the 
Queen, who had not yet forgiven him, and who had 
set her heart on having a watch, and partly because he 
expected that a development of the country's resources, 
in consequence of a freer use of machinery, would 
bring more money into his exchequer. Bridgeford 
fought hard and wisely here, but they had gained so 
much by the Musical Bank Managers being recognised 
as the authorised exponents of Sunchildism, that they 
thought it wise to yield — apparently with a good 
grace — and thus gild the pill which his Majesty was 
about to swallow. But even then they feared the con- 
sequences that are already beginning to appear, and 
which, if I mistake not, will assume far more serious 
proportions in the future." 

"See," said my father suddenly, we are coming to 
another procession, and they have got some banners; 
let us walk a little quicker and overtake it." 

"Horrible !" replied Mr. Balmy fiercely. "You must 
be short-sighted, or you could never have called my 
attention to it. Let us get it behind us as fast as pos- 
sible, and not so maich as look at it." 

"Oh, yes, yes," said my father, "it is indeed horrible, 
I had not seen what it was." 

He had not the faintest idea what the matter was, 
but he let Mr. Balmy walk a Httle ahead of him, so 



l6o Erewhon Revisited 

that he could see the banners, the most important of 
which he found to display a balloon pure and simple, 
with one figure in the car. True, at the top of the 
banner there was a smudge which might be taken for 
a little chariot, and some very little horses, but the 
balloon was the only thing insisted on. As for the 
procession, it consisted entirely of men, whom a 
smaller banner announced to be workmen from the 
Fairmead iron and steel works. There was a third 
banner, which said, ''Science as well as Sunchildism." 



CHAPTER XV 

THE TEMPLE IS DEDICATED TO MY FATHER,, AND CER- 
TAIN EXTRACTS ARE READ FROM HIS SUPPOSED 
SAYINGS 

"It is enough to break one's heart," said Mr. 
Balmy when he had outstripped the procession, and 
my father was again beside him. " *As well as,' in- 
deed ! We know what that means. Wherever there is 
a factory there is a hot-bed of unbelief. 'As well as' ! 
Why it is a defiance." 

"What, I wonder," said my father innocently, 
"must the Sunchild's feelings be, as he looks down 
on this procession. For there can be little doubt 
that he is doing so." 

"There can be no doubt at all," replied Mr. Balmy, 
"that he is taking note of it, and of all else that is hap- 
pening this day in Erewhon. Heaven grant that he be 
not so angered as to chastise the innocent as well as 
the guilty." 

"I doubt," said my father, "his being so angry even 
with this procession, as you think he is." 

Here, fearing an outburst of indignation, he found 
an excuse for rapidly changing the conversation. 
Moreover he was angry with himself for playing upon 
this poor good creature. He had not done so of malice 
prepense; he had begun to deceive him, because he 
believed himself to be in danger if he spoke the truth; 

l6i 



i62 Erewhon Revisited 

and though he knew the part to be an unworthy one, 
he could not escape from continuing to play it, if he 
was to discover things that he was not likely to dis- 
cover otherwise. 

Often, however, he had checked himself. It had 
been on the tip of his tongue to be illuminated with 
the words, 

Sukoh and Sukop were two pretty men, 
They lay in bed till the clock struck ten, 

and to follow it up with. 

Now with the drops of this most Yknarc time 
My love looks fresh, 

in order to see how Mr. Balmy would interpret the 
assertion here made about the Professors, and what 
statement he would connect with his own Erewhonian 
name; but he had restrained himself. 

The more he saw, and the more he heard, the more 
shocked he was at the mischief he had done. See how 
he had unsettled the little mind this poor, dear, good 
gentleman had ever had, till he was now a mere slave 
to preconception. And how many more had he not 
in like manner brought to the verge of idiocy? How 
many again had he not made more corrupt than they 
were before, even though he had not deceived them — 
as for example, Hanky and Panky. And the young? 
how could such a lie as that a chariot and four horses 
came down out of the clouds enter seriously into the 
life of any one, without distorting his mental vision, 
if not ruining it? 

And yet, the more he reflected, the more he also saw 



The Dedication 163 

that he could do no good by saying who he was. Mat- 
ters had gone so far that though he spoke with the 
tongues of men and angels he would not be listened 
to; and even if he were, it might easily prove that he 
had added harm to that which he had done already. 
No. As soon as he had heard Hanky's sermon, he 
would begin to work his way back, and if the Profes- 
sors had not yet removed their purchase, he would 
recover it; but he would pin a bag containing about 
five pounds worth of nuggets on to the tree in which 
they had hidden it, and, if possible, he would find 
some way of sending the rest to George. 

He let Mr. Balmy continue talking, glad that this 
gentleman required little more than monosyllabic ans- 
wers, and still more glad, in spite of some agitation, 
to see that they were now nearing Sunch'ston, towards 
which a great concourse of people was hurrying from 
Clearwater, and more distant towns on the main road. 
Many whole families were coming, — the fathers and 
mothers carrying the smaller children, and also their 
own shoes and stockings, which they would put on 
when nearing the town. Most of the pilgrims brought 
provisions with them. All wore European costumes, 
but only a few of them wore it reversed, and these 
were almost invariably of higher social status than the 
great body of the people, who were mainly peasants. 

When they reached the town, my father was re- 
lieved at finding that Mr. Balmy had friends on whom 
he wished to call before going to the temple. He 
asked my father to come with him, but my father said 
that he too had friends, and would leave him for the 
present, while hoping to meet him again later in the 
day. The two, therefore, shook hands with great 



164 Erewhon Revisited 

effusion, and went their several ways. My father's 
way took him first into a confectioner's shop, where 
he bought a couple of Sunchild buns, which he put 
into his pocket, and refreshed himself with a bottle 
of Sunchild cordial and water. All shops except those 
dealing in refreshments were closed, and the town was 
gaily decorated with flags and flowers, often fes- 
tooned into words or emblems proper for the occasion. 

My father, it being now a quarter to eleven, made 
his way towards the temple, and his heart was clouded 
with care as he walked along. Not only was his heart 
clouded, but his brain also was oppressed, and he 
reeled so much on leaving the confectioner's shop, that 
he had to catch hold of some railings till the faintness 
and giddiness left him. He knew the feeling to be 
the same as what he had felt on the Friday evening, 
but he had no idea of the cause, and as soon as the 
giddiness left him he thought there was nothing the 
matter with him. 

Turning down a side street that led into the main 
square of the town, he found himself opposite the 
south end of the temple, with its two lofty towers that 
flanked the richly decorated main entrance. I will not 
attempt to describe the architecture, for my father 
could give me little information on this point. He 
saw only the south front for two or three minutes, 
and was not impressed by it, save in so far as it was 
richly ornamented — evidently at great expense — and 
very large. Even if he had had a longer look, I doubt 
whether I should have got more out of him, for he 
knew nothing of architecture, and I fear his test 
whether a building was good or bad, was whether it 
looked old and weather-beaten or no. No matter what 




a. Table with cashier's seat on 
either side, and alms-box in 
front. The picture is ex- 
hibited on a scafifolding be- 
hin<i it. 

*. The feliquary. 

c. The President's chair. 

d. Pulpit and lectern. 
e. 
f- 

1 







Side doors. 



i. Yram's seat. 

k. Seats of George and the Sun- 
child. 

o' Pillars. 

A,B,C, D, E, F, G, H, blocks 
of seats. 

/. Steps leading from the apse 
to the nave. 

A'and Z,. Towers. 

,M. Steps and main en* 
trance. 

N. Robing-room. 



165 



1 66 Erewhon Revisited 

a building was, if it was three or four hundred years 
old he liked it, whereas, if it was new, he would look 
to nothing but whether it kept the rain out. Indeed I 
have heard him say that the mediaeval sculpture on 
some of our great cathedrals often only pleases us be- 
cause time and weather have set their seals upon it, 
and that if we could see it as it was when it left the 
mason's hands, we would find it no better than much 
that is now turned out in the Euston Road. 

The ground plan here given will help the reader to 
understand the few following pages more easily. 

The building was led up to by a flight of steps (M), 
and on entering it my father found it to consist of a 
spacious nave, with two aisles and an apse which was 
raised some three feet above the nave and aisles. 
There were no transepts. In the apse there was the 
table (a), with the two bowls of Musical Bank 
money mentioned on an earlier page, as also the alms- 
box in front of it. 

At some little distance in front of the table stood 
the President's chair (c), or I might almost call it 
throne. It was so placed that his back would be turned 
towards the table, which fact again shews that the 
table was not regarded as having any greater sanctity 
than the rest of the temple. 

Behind the table, the picture already spoken of was 
raised aloft. There was no balloon ; some clouds that 
hung about the lower part of the chariot served to 
conceal the fact that the painter was uncertain whether 
it ought to have wheels or no. The horses were with- 
out driver, and my father thought that some one 
ought to have had them in hand, for they were in far 
too excited a state to be left safely to themselves. 



The Dedication 167 

They had hardly any harness, but what Httle there 
was was enriched with gold bosses. My mother was 
in Erewhonian costume, my father in European, but 
he wore his clothes reversed. Both he and my mother 
seemed to be bowing graciously to an unseen crowd 
beneath them, and in the distance, near the bottom of 
the picture, was a fairly accurate representation of the 
Sunch'ston new temple. High up, on the right hand, 
was a disc, raised and gilt, to represent the sun; on 
it, in low relief, there was an indication of a gorgeous 
palace, in which, no doubt, the sun was supposed to 
live ; though how they made it all out my father could 
not conceive. 

On the right of the table there was a reliquary (b) 
of glass, much adorned with gold, or more probably 
gilding, for gold was so scarce in Erewhon that gild- 
ing would be as expensive as a thin plate of gold 
would be in Europe : but there is no knowing. The 
reliquary was attached to a portable stand some five 
feet high, and inside it was the relic already referred 
to. The crowd was so great that my father could 
not get near enough to see what it contained, but I 
may say here, that when, two days later, circumstances 
compelled him to have a close look at it, he saw that it 
consisted of about a dozen fine coprolites, deposited by 
some antediluvian creature or creatures, which, what- 
ever else they may have been, were certainly not 
horses. 

In the apse there were a few cross benches (G and 
H) on either side, with an open space between them, 
which was partly occupied by the President's seat al- 
ready mentioned. Those on the right, as one looked 
towards the apse, were for the Managers and Cashiers 



i68 Erewhon Revisited 

of the Bank, while those on the left were for their 
wives and daughters. 

In the centre of the nave, only a few feet in front 
of the steps leading to the apse, was a handsome pulpit 
and lectern (d). The pulpit was raised some feet 
above the ground, and was so roomy that the preacher 
could walk about in it. On either side of it there were 
cross benches with backs (E and F) ; those on the 
right were reserved for the Mayor, civic functionaries, 
and distinguished visitors, while those on the left were 
for their wives and daughters. 

Benches with backs (A, B, C, D) were placed about 
half-way down both nave and aisles — those in the 
nave being divided so as to allow a free passage be- 
tween them. The rest of the temple was open space, 
about which people might walk at their will. There 
were side doors (e, g, and /, h) at the upper and 
lower end of each aisle. Over the main entrance was 
a gallery in which singers were placed. 

As my father was worming his way among the 
crowd, which was now very dense, he was startled at 
finding himself tapped lightly on the shoulder, and 
turning round in alarm was confronted by the beaming 
face of George. 

"How do you do. Professor Panky?" said the 
youth — who had decided thus to address him. ''What 
are you doing here among the common people? Why 
have you not taken your place in one of the seats re- 
served for our distinguished visitors? I am afraid 
they must be all full by this time, but I will see what 
I can do for you. Come with me." 

"Thank you," said my father. His heart beat so 



The Dedication 169 

fast that this was all he could say, and he followed 
meek as a lamb. 

With some difficulty the two made their way to 
the right-hand corner seats of block C, for every seat 
in the reserved block was taken. The places which 
George wanted for my father and for himself were 
already occupied by two young men of about eighteen 
and nineteen, both of them well-grown, and of pre- 
possessing appearance. My father saw by the trun- 
cheons they carried that they were special constables; 
but he took no notice of this, for there were many 
others scattered about the crowd. George whispered 
a few words to one of them, and to my father's sur- 
prise they both gave up their seats, which appear on 
the plan as {k). 

It afterwards transpired that these two young men 
were George's brothers, who by his desire had taken 
the seats some hours ago, for it was here that George 
had determined to place himself and my father if he 
could find him. He chose these places because they 
would be near enough to let his mother (who was at i, 
in the middle of the front row of block E, to the left 
of the pulpit) see my father without being so near as 
to embarrass him; he could also see and be seen by 
Hanky, and hear every word of his sermon; but per- 
haps his chief reason had been the fact that they were 
not far from the side-door at the upper end of the 
right-hand aisle, while there was no barrier to inter- 
rupt rapid egress should this prove necessary. 

It was now high time that they should sit down, 
which they accordingly did. George sat at the end 
of the bench, and thus had my father on his left. My 
father was rather uncomfortable at seeing the young 



170 Erewhon Revisited 

men whom they had turned out, standing against a 
column close by, but George said that this was how 
it was to be, and there was nothing to be done but to 
submit. The young men seemed quite happy, which 
puzzled my father, who of course had no idea that 
their action was preconcerted. 

Panky was in the first row of block F, so that my 
father could not see his face except sometimes when he 
turned round. He was sitting on the Mayor's right 
hand, while Dr. Downie was on his left ; he looked at 
my father once or twice in a puzzled way, as though 
he ought to have known him, but my father did not 
think he recognised him. Hanky was still with Presi- 
dent Gurgoyle and others in the robing-room, N; 
Yram had already taken her seat : my father knew her 
in a moment, though he pretended not to do so when 
George pointed her out to him. Their eyes met for a 
second; Yram turned hers quickly away, and my 
father could not see a trace of recognition in her face. 
At no time during the whole ceremony did he catch 
her looking at him again. 

"Why, you stupid man," she said to him later on in 
the day with a quick, kindly smile, *T was looking at 
you all the time. As soon as the President or Hanky 
began to talk about you I knew you would stare at 
him, and then I could look. As soon as they left off 
talking about you I knew you would be looking at me, 
unless you went to sleep — and as I did not know which 
you might be doing, I waited till they began to talk 
about you again." 

My father had hardly taken note of his surround- 
ings when the choir began singing, accompanied by 
a few feeble flutes and lutes, or whatever the name 



The Dedication 171 

of the instrument should be, but with no violins, for 
he knew nothing of the violin, and had not been able 
to teach the Erewhonians anything about it. The 
voices were all in unison, and the tune they sang was 
one which my father had taught Yram to sing; but 
he could not catch the words. 

As soon as the singing began, a procession, headed 
by the venerable Dr. Gurgoyle, President of the Mu- 
sical Banks of the province, began to issue from the 
robing-room, and move towards the middle of the 
apse. The President was sumptuously dressed, but 
he wore no mitre, nor anything to suggest an English 
or European Bishop. The Vice-President, Head 
Manager, Vice-Manager, and some Cashiers of the 
Bank, now ranged themselves on either side of him, 
and formed an impressive group as they stood, gor- 
geously arrayed, at the top of the steps leading from 
the apse to the nave. Here they waited till the singers 
left off singing. 

When the litany, or hymn, or whatever it should be 
called, was over, the Head Manager left the Presi- 
dent's side and came down to the lectern in the nave, 
where he announced himself as about to read some 
passages from the Sunchild's Sayings. Perhaps be- 
cause it was the first day of the year according to their 
new calendar, the reading began with the first chapter, 
the whole of which was read. My father told me that 
he quite well remembered having said the last verse, 
which he still held as true; hardly a word of the rest 
was ever spoken by him, though he recognized his own 
influence in almost all of it. The reader paused, with 
good effect, for about five seconds between each para- 



172 Erewhon Revisited 

graph, and read slowly and very clearly. The chapter 
was as follows : — 



"These are the words of the Sunchild about God and 
man. He said — 

1. God is the baseless basis of all thoughts, things, and 
deeds. 

2. So that those who say that there is a God, lie, unless 
they also mean that there is no God ; and those who say that 
there is no God, lie, unless they also mean that there is a 
God. 

3. It is very true to say that man is made after the 
likeness of God ; and yet it is very untrue to say this. 

4. God lives and moves in every atom throughout the 
universe. Therefore it is wrong to think of Him as 'Him' 
and 'He,' save as by the clutching of a drowning man at a 
straw. 

5. God is God to us only so long as we cannot see him. 
When we are near to seeing Him He vanishes, and we 
behold Nature in His stead. 

6. We approach Him most nearly when we think of 
Him as our expression for Man's highest conception, of 
goodness, wisdom, and power. But we cannot rise to Him 
above the level of our own highest selves. 

7. We remove ourselves most far from Him when we 
invest Him with human form and attributes. 

8. My father the sun, the earth, the moon, and all planets 
that roll round my father, are to God but as a single cell in 
our bodies to ourselves. 

9. He is as much above my father, as my father is above 
men and women. 

10. The universe is instinct with the mind of God. The 
mind of God is in all that has mind throughout all worlds. 
There is no God but the Universe, and man, in this world 
is His prophet. 

11. God's conscious life, nascent, so far as this world is 
concerned, in the infusoria, adolescent in the higher mam- 
mals, approaches maturity on this earth in man. All these 
living beings are members one of another, and of God. 



The Dedication 173 

12. Therefore, as man cannot live without God in the 
world, so neither can God live in this world without man- 
kind. 

13. If we speak ill of God in our ignorance it may be for- 
given us; but if we speak ill of His Holy Spirit indwelling 
in good men and women it may not be forgiven us." 

The Head Manager now resumed his place by 
President Gurgoyle's side, and the President in the 
name of his Majesty the King declared the temple to 
be hereby dedicated to the contemplation of the Sun- 
child and the better exposition of his teaching. This 
was all that was said. The reliquary was then brought 
forward and placed at the top of the steps leading 
from the apse to the nave; but the original intention 
of carrying it round the temple was abandoned for 
fear of accidents through the pressure round it of the 
enormous multitudes who were assembled. More 
singing followed of a simple but impressive kind ; dur- 
ing this I am afraid I must own that my father, tired 
with his walk, dropped off into a refreshing slumber, 
from which he did not wake till George nudged him 
and told him not to snore, just as the Vice-Manager 
was going towards the lectern to read another chapter 
of the Sunchild's Sayings — which was as follows: — 

The Sunchild also spoke to us a parable about the unwis- 
dom of the children yet unborn, who though they know so 
much, yet do not know as much as they think they do. 

He said: — 

"The unborn have knowledge of one another so long as 
they are unborn, and this w^ithout impediment from walls or 
material obstacles. The unborn children in any city form 
a population apart, who talk with one another and tell each 
other about their developmental progress. 

"They have no knowledge, and cannot even conceive the 



174 Erewhon Revisited 



existence of anything that is not such as they are themselves. 
Those who have been born are to them what the dead are 
to us. They can see no life in them, and know no more 
about them than they do of any stage in their own past 
development other than the one through which they are 
passing at the moment. They do not even know that their 
mothers are alive — much less that their mothers were once 
as they now are. To an embryo, its mother is simply the 
environment, and is looked upon much as our inorganic sur- 
roundings are by ourselves. 

"The great terror of their lives is the fear of birth, — 
that they shall have to leave the only thing that they can 
think of as life, and enter upon a dark unknown which is 
to them tantamount to annihilation. 

"Some, indeed, among them have maintained that birth 
is not the death which they commonly deem it, but that 
there is a life beyond the womb of which they as yet know 
nothing, and which is a million fold more truly life than 
anything they have yet been able even to imagine. But the 
greater number shake their yet unfashioned heads and say 
they have no evidence for this that will stand a moment's 
examination. 

" 'Nay,' answer the others, *so much work, so elaborate, 
so wondrous as that whereon we are now so busily engaged 
must have a purpose, though the purpose is beyond our 
grasp.' 

" 'Never,' reply the first speakers ; 'our pleasure in the 
work is sufficient justification for it. Who has ever par- 
taken of this life you speak of, and re-entered into the womb 
to tell us of it? Granted that some few have pretended to 
have done this, but how completely have their stories broken 
down when subjected to the tests of sober criticism. No. 
When we are born we are born, and there is an end of us.* 

"But in the hour of birth, when they can no longer re- 
enter the womb and tell the others. Behold! they find that 
it is not so." 

Here the reader again closed his book and resumed 
his place in the apse. 



CHAPTER XVI 

PROFESSOR HANKY PREACHES A SERMON, IN THE 
COURSE OF WHICH MY FATHER DECLARES HIM- 
SELF TO BE THE SUNCHILD 

Professor Hanky then went up into the pulpit, 
richly but soberly robed in vestments the exact nature 
of which J. cannot determine. His carriage was dig- 
nified, and the harsh lines on his face gave it a strong 
individuality, which, though it did not attract, con- 
veyed an impression of power that could not fail to 
interest. As soon as he had given attention time to 
fix itself upon him, he began his sermon without text 
or preliminary matter of any kind, and apparently 
without notes. 

He spoke clearly and very quietly, especially at the 
beginning; he used action whenever it could point his 
meaning, or give life and colour, but there was no 
approach to staginess or even oratorical display. In 
fact, he spoke as one who meant what he was saying, 
and desired that his hearers should accept his mean- 
ing, fully confident in his good faith. His use of 
pause was effective. After the word "mistake," at the 
end of the opening sentence, he held up his half-bent 
hand and paused for full three seconds, looking in- 
tently at his audience as he did so. Every one felt the 
idea to be here enounced that was to dominate the 
sermon. 

175 



176 Erewhon Revisited 

The sermon — so much of it as I can find room for 
— was as follows : — 

"My friends, let there be no mistake. At such a 
time, as this, it is well we should look back upon the 
path by which we have travelled, and forward to the 
goal towards which we are tending. As it was neces- 
sary that the material foundations of this building 
should be so sure that there shall be no subsidence in 
the superstructure, so is it not less necessary to ensure 
that there shall be no subsidence in the immaterial 
structure that we have raised in consequence of the 
Sunchild's sojourn among us. Therefore, my friends, 
I again say, 'Let there be no mistake.' Each stone that 
goes towards the uprearing of this visible fane, each, 
human soul that does its part in building the invisible 
temple of our national faith, is bearing witness to, and 
lending its support to, that which is either the truth 
of truths, or the baseless fabric of a dream. 

"My friends, this is the only possible alternative. 
He in whose name we are here assembled, is either 
worthy of more reverential honour than we can ever 
pay him, or he is worthy of no more honour than 
any other honourable man among ourselves. There 
can be no halting between these two opinions. The 
question of questions is, was he the child of the 
tutelary god of this world — the sun, and is it to the 
palace of the sun that he returned when he left us, or 
was he, as some amongst us still do not hesitate to 
maintain, a mere man, escaping by unusual but strictly 
natural means to some part of this earth with which 
we are unacquainted. My friends, either we are on 
a right path or on a very wrong one, and in a matter 



Prof. Hanky's Sermon 177 

of such supreme importance — there must be no mis- 
take. 

"1 need not remind those of you whose privilege 
it is to Hve in Sunch'ston, of the charm attendant on 
the Sunchild's personal presence and conversation, 
nor of his quick sympathy, his keen intellect, his readi- 
ness to adapt himself to the capacities of all those who 
came to see him while he was in prison. He adored 
children, and it was on them that some of his most 
conspicuous miracles were performed. Many a time 
when a child had fallen and hurt itself, was he known 
to make the place well by simply kissing it. Nor need 
I recall to your minds the spotless purity of his life — 
so spotless that not one breath of slander has ever 
dared to visit it. I was one of the not very many who 
had the privilege of being admitted to the inner circle 
of his friends during the later weeks that he was 
amongst us. I loved him dearly, and it will ever be 
the proudest recollection of my life that he deigned to 
return me no small measure of affection." 

My father, furious as he was at finding himself 
dragged into complicity with this man's imposture, 
could not resist a smile at the effrontery with which 
he lowered his tone here, and appeared unwilling to 
dwell on an incident which he could not recall without 
being affected almost to tears, and mere allusion to 
which had involved an apparent self-display that was 
above all things repugnant to him. What a difference 
between the Hanky of Thursday evening with its 
''never set eyes on him and hope I never shall," and 
the Hanky of Sunday morning, who now looked as 
modest as Cleopatra might have done had she been 



178 Erewhon Revisited 

standing godmother to a little blue-eyed girl — Bellero- 
phon's first-born baby. 

Having recovered from his natural, but promptly 
repressed, emotion, the Professor continued : — 

''I need not remind you of the purpose for which 
so many of us, from so many parts of oi«ir kingdom, 
are here assembled. We know what we have come 
hither to do : we are come each one of us to sign and 
seal by his presence the bond of his assent to those 
momentous Changes, which have found their first 
great material expression in the temple that you see 
around you. 

"You all know how, in accordance with the ex- 
pressed will of the Sunchild, the Presidents and 
Vice-Presidents of the Musical Banks began as soon 
as he had left us to examine, patiently, carefully, 
earnestly, and without bias of any kind, firstly the 
evidences in support of the Sunchild's claim to be the 
son of the tutelar deity of this world, and secondly 
the precise nature of his instructions as regards the 
future position and authority of the Musical Banks. 

"My friends, it is easy to understand why the Sun- 
child should have given us these instructions. With 
that foresight which is the special characteristic of 
divine, as compared with human, wisdom, he desired 
that the evidences in support of his superhuman char- 
acter should be collected, sifted, and placed on record, 
before anything was either lost through the death of 
those who could alone substantiate it, or unduly sup- 
plied through the enthusiasm of over-zealous vision- 
aries. The greater any true miracle has been, the more 
certainly will false ones accrete round it; here, then, 
we find the explanation of the command the Sunchild 



Prof. Hanky's Sermon 179 

gave to us to gather, verify, and record, the facts of 
his sojourn here in Erewhon. For above all things 
he held it necessary to ensure that there should be 
neither mistake, nor even possibility of mistake. 

^'Consider for a moment what differences of 
opinion would infallibly have arisen, if the evidences 
for the miraculous character of the Sunchild's mis- 
sion had been conflicting — if they had rested on 
versions each claiming to be equally authoritative, but 
each hopelessly irreconcilable on vital points with 
every single other. What would future generations 
have said in answer to those who bade them fling all 
human experience to the winds, on the strength of 
records written they knew not certainly by whom, nor 
how long after the marvels that they recorded, and 
of which all that could be certainly said was that no 
two of them told the same story? 

**Who that believes either in God or man — who 
with any self-respect, or respect for the gift of reason 
with which God had endowed him, either would, or 
could, believe that a chariot and four horses had come 
down from heaven, and gone back again with human 
or quasi-human occupants, unless the evidences for 
the fact left no loophole for escape? If a single loop- 
hole were left him, he would be unpardonable, not for 
disbelieving the story, but for believing it. The sin 
against God would lie not in want of faith, but in 
faith. 

''My friends, there are two sins in matters of 
belief. There is that of believing on too little evi- 
dence, and that of requiring too much before we are 
convinced. The guilt of the latter is incurred, alas ! by 
not a few amongst us at the present day, but if the 



i8o Erewhon Revisited 

testimony to the truth of the wondrous event so faith- 
fully depicted on the picture that confronts you had 
been less contemporaneous, less authoritative, less 
unanimous, future generations — and it is for them 
that we should now provide — would be guilty of the 
first-named, and not less heinous sin if they believed 
at all. 

"Small wonder, then, that the Sunchild, having 
come amongst us for our advantage, not his own, 
would not permit his beneficent designs to be endan- 
gered by the discrepancies, mythical developments, 
idiosyncracies, and a hundred other defects inevitably 
attendant on amateur and irresponsible recording. 
Small wonder, then, that he should have chosen the 
officials of the Musical Banks, from the Presidents 
and Vice-Presidents down\vards to be the authorita- 
tive exponents of his teaching, the depositaries of his 
traditions, and his representatives here on earth till 
he shall again see fit to visit us. For he will come. 
Nay it is even possible that he may be here amongst 
us at this very moment, disguised so that none may 
know him, and intent only on vv^atching our devotion 
towards him. If this be so, let me implore him, in the 
name of the sun his father, to reveal himself." 

Now Hanky had already given my father more 
than one look that had made him uneasy. He had 
evidently recognized him as the supposed ranger of 
last Thursday evening. Twice he had run his eye like 
a searchlight over the front benches opposite to him, 
and when the beam had reached my father there had 
been no more searching. It was beginning to dawn 
upon my father that George might have discovered that 
he was not Professor Panky; was it for this reason 



Prof. Hanky's Sermon i8i 

that these two young special constables, though they 
gave up their places, still kept so close to him? Was 
George only waiting his opportunity to arrest him — 
not of course even suspecting who he was — but as a 
foreign devil who had tried to pass himself off as 
Professor Panky? Had this been the meaning of his 
having followed him to Fairmead? And should he 
have to be thrown into the Blue Pool by George after 
all. *lt would serve me," said he to himself, "richly 
right." 

These fears which had been taking shape for some 
few minutes were turned almost to certainties by the 
half -contemptuous glance Hanky threw towards him 
as he uttered what was obviously intended as a chal- 
lenge. He saw that all was over, and was starting 
to his feet to declare himself, and thus fall into the 
trap that Hanky was laying for him, when George 
gripped him tightly by the knee and whispered, "Don't 
— you are in great danger," And he smiled kindly as 
he spoke. 

My father sank back dumbfounded. "You know 
me?" he whispered in reply, 

^ "Perfectly. So does Hanky, so does my mother; 
say no more," and he again smiled. 

George, as my father afterwards learned, had hoped 
that he would reveal himself, and had determined in 
spite of his mother's instructions, to give him an 
opportunity of doing so. It was for this reason that 
he had not arrested him quietly, as he could very well 
have done, before the service began. He wished to 
discover what manner of man his father was, and was 
quite happy as soon as he saw that he would have 
spoken out if he had not been checked. He had not 



1 82 Erewhon Revisited 

yet caught Hanky's motive in trying to goad my 
father, but on seeing that he was trying to do this, he 
knew that a trap was being laid, and that my father 
must not be allowed to speak. 

Almost immediately, however, he perceived that 
while his eyes had been turned on Hanky, two burly 
vergers had wormed their way through the crowd and 
had taken their stand close to his two brothers. Then 
he understood, and understood also how to frustrate. 

As for my father, George's ascendancy over him — 
quite felt by George — was so absolute that he could 
think of nothing now but the exceeding great joy of 
finding his fears groundless, and of delivering himself 
up to his son's guidance in the assurance that the void 
in his heart was filled, and that his wager not only 
would be held as won, but was being already paid. 
How they had found out, why he was not to speak as 
he would assuredly have done — for he was in a white 
heat of fury — what did it all matter now that he had 
found that which he had feared he should fail to 
find ? He gave George a puzzled smile, and composed 
himself as best he could to hear the continuation of 
Hanky's sermon, which was as follows : — 

''Who could the Sunchild have chosen, even though 
he had been gifted with no more than human sagacity, 
but the body- of men whom he selected ? It becomes 
me but ill to speak so warmly in favour of that body 
of whom I am the least worthy member, but what 
other is there in Erewhon so above all suspicion of 
slovenliness, self-seeking, preconceived bias, or bad 
faith? If there was one set of qualities more essential 
than another for the conduct of the investigations en- 
trusted to us by the Sunchild, it was those that turn 



Prof. Hanky's Sermon 183 

on meekness and freedom from all spiritual pride. I 
believe I can say quite truly that these are the qualities 
for which Bridge ford is more especially renowned. 
The readiness of her Professors to learn even from 
those who at first sight may seem least able to instruct 
them — the gentleness with which they correct an op- 
ponent if they feel it incumbent upon them to do so, the 
promptitude with which they acknowledge error when 
it is pointed out to them and quit a position no matter 
how deeply they have been committed to it, at the first 
moment in which they see that they cannot hold it 
righteously, their delicate sense of honour, their utter 
immunity from what the Sunchild used to call log- 
rolling or intrigue, the scorn with which they regard 
anything like hitting below the belt — these I believe I 
may truly say are the virtues for which Bridge ford 
is pre-eminently renowned." 

The Professor went on to say a great deal more 
about the fitness of Bridgeford and the Musical Bank 
managers for the task imposed on them by the Sun- 
child, but here my father's attention flagged — nor, on 
looking at the verbatim report of the sermon that ap- 
peared next morning in the leading Sunch'ston journal, 
do I see reason to reproduce Hanky's words on this 
head. It was all to shew that there had been no pos- 
sibility of mistake. 

Meanwhile George was writing on a scrap of paper 
as though he was taking notes of the sermon. Pres- 
ently he slipped this into my father's hand. It ran : — 

"You see those vergers standing near my brothers, 
who gave up their seats to us. Hanky tried to goad 
you into speaking that they might arrest you, and get 
you into the Bank prisons. If you fall into their 



184 Erewhon Revisited 

hands you are lost. I must arrest you instantly on a 
charge of poaching on the King's preserves, and make 
you my prisoner. Let those vergers catch sight of the 
warrant which I shall now give you. Read it and 
return it to me. Come with me quietly after service. 
I think you had better not reveal yourself at all." 

As soon as he had given my father time to read the 
foregoing, George took a warrant out of his pocket. 
My father pretended to read it and returned it. George 
then laid his hand on his shoulder, and in an under- 
tone arrested him. He then wrote on another scrap 
of paper and passed it on to the elder of his two 
brothers. It was to the effect that he had now arrested 
my father, and that if the vergers attempted in any 
way to interfere between him and his prisoner, his 
brothers were to arrest both of them, w^hich, as special 
constables, they had power to do. 

Yram had noted Hanky's attempt to goad my 
father, and had not been prepared for his stealing a 
march upon her by trying to get my father arrested 
by Musical Bank officials, rather than by her son. On 
the preceding evening this last plan had been arranged 
on ; and she knew nothing of the note that Hanky had 
sent an hour or two later to the Manager of the temple 
— the substance of which the reader can sufficiently 
guess. When she had heard Hanky's words and saw 
the vergers, she was for a few minutes seriously 
alarmed, but she was reassured when she saw George 
give my father the warrant, and her two sons evi- 
dently explaining the position to the vergers. 

Hanky had by this time changed his theme, and was 
warning his hearers of the dangers that would follow 
on the legalization of the medical profession, and the 



Prof. Hanky's Sermon 185 

repeal of the edicts against machines. Space forbids 
me to give his picture of the horrible tortures that 
future generations would be put to by medical men, if 
these were not duly kept in check by the influence of 
the Musical Banks; the horrors of the inquisition in 
the middle ages are nothing to what he depicted as 
certain to ensue if medical men were ever to have 
much money at their command. The only people in 
whose hands money might be trusted safely were those 
who presided over the Musical Banks. This tirade 
was followed by one not less alarming about the 
growth of materialistic tendencies among the artisans 
employed in the production of mechanical inventions. 
My father, though his eyes had been somewhat opened 
by the second of the two processions he had seen on 
his way to Sunch'ston, was not prepared to find that 
in spite of the superficially almost universal accept- 
ance of the new faith, there was a powerful, and it 
would seem growing, undercurrent of scepticism, with 
a desire to reduce his escape with my mother to a 
purely natural occurence. 

*'It is not enough," said Hanky, "that the Sunchild 
vshould have ensured the preparation of authoritative 
evidence of his supernatural character. The evidences 
happily exist in overwhelming strength, but they must 
be brought home to minds that as yet have stubbornly 
refused to receive them. During the last five years 
there has been an enormous increase in the number of 
those whose occupation in the manufacture of ma- 
chines inclines them to a materialistic explanation even 
of the most obviously miraculous events, and the 
growth of this class in our midst constituted, and still 
constitutes, a grave danger to the state. 



1 86 Erewhon Revisited 

**It was to meet this that the society was formed on 
behalf of which I appeal fearlessly to your generosity. 
It is called, as most of you doubtless know, the Sun- 
child Evidence Society; and his Majesty the King 
graciously consented to become its Patron. This so- 
ciety not only collects additional evidences — indeed it 
is entirely due to its labours that the precious relic 
now in this temple was discovered — but it is its be- 
neficent purpose to lay those that have been authori- 
tatively investigated before men who, if left to 
themselves, would either neglect them altogether, or 
worse still reject them. 

"For the first year or two the efforts of the society 
met with but little success among those for whose 
benefit they were more particularly intended, but dur- 
ing the present year the working classes in some cities 
and towns (stimulated very much by the lectures of 
my illustrious friend Professor Panky) have shewn a 
most remarkable and zealous interest in Sunchild evi- 
dences, and have formed themselves into local branches 
for the study and defence of Sunchild truth. 

"Yet in spite of all this need — of all this patient 
labour and really very gratifying success — the sub- 
scriptions to the society no longer furnish it with its 
former very modest income — an income which is de- 
plorably insufficient if the organization is to be kept 
effective, and the work adequately performed. In 
spite of the most rigid economy, the committee have 
been compelled to part with a considerable portion of 
their small reserve fund (provided by a legacy) to 
tide over difficulties. But this method of balancing 
expenditure and income is very unsatisfactory, and 
cannot be long continued. 



Prof. Hanky's Sermon 187 

"I am led to plead for the society with especial in- 
sistence at the present time, inasmuch as more than 
one of those whose unblemished life has made them 
fitting recipients of such a signal favour, have recently 
had visions informing them that the Sunchild will 
again shortly visit us. We know not when he will 
come, but when he comes, my friends, let him not find 
us unmindful of, nor ungrateful for, the inestimable 
services he has rendered us. For come he surely will. 
Either in winter, what time icicles hang by the wall 
and milk comes frozen home in the pail — or in sum- 
mer when days are at their longest and the mowing 
grass is about — there will be an hour, either at mom, 
or eve, or in the middle day, when he will again surely 
come. May it be mine to be among those who are 
then present to receive him." 

Here he again glared at my father, whose blood was 
boiling. George had not positively forbidden him to 
speak out ; he therefore sprang to his feet, *'You lying 
hound," he cried, "I am the Sunchild, and you know 
it." 

George, who knew that he had my father in his 
own hands, made no attempt to stop him, and was 
delighted that he should have declared himself though 
he had felt it his duty to tell him not to do so. Yram 
turned pale. Hanky roared out, ''Tear him in pieces 
— leave not a single limb on his body. Take him out 
and burn him alive." The vergers made a dash for 
him — but George's brothers seized them. The crowd 
seemed for a moment inclined to do as Hanky bade 
them, but Yram rose from her place, and held up her 
hand as one who claimed attention. She advanced 
towards George and my father as unconcernedly as 



i88 Erewhon Revisited 

though she were merely walking out of church, but 
she still held her hand uplifted. All eyes were turned 
on her, as well as on George and my father, and the 
icy calm of her self-possession chilled those who were 
inclined for the moment to take Hanky's words lit- 
erally. There was not a trace of fluster in her gait, 
action, or words, as she said — 

"My friends, this temple, and this day, must not be 
profaned with blood. My son will take this poor 
madman to the prison. Let him be judged and pun- 
ished according to law. Make room, that he and my 
son may pass." 

Then, turning to my father, she said, "Go quietly 
with the Ranger. *' 

Having so spoken, she returned to her seat as 
unconcernedly as she had left it. 

Hanky for a time continued to foam at the mouth 
and roar out, "Tear him to pieces! burn him alive!'* 
but when he saw that there was no further hope of 
getting the people to obey him, he collapsed on to a 
seat in the pulpit, mopped his bald head, and consoled 
himself with a great pinch of powder which corre- 
sponds very closely to our own snuff. 

George led my father out by the side door at the 
north end of the western aisle; the people eyed him 
intently, but made way for him without demonstra- 
tion. One voice alone was heard to cry out, "Yes, he 
is the Sunchild!" My father glanced at the speaker, 
and saw that he was the interpreter who had taught 
him the Erewhonian language when he was in prison. 

George, seeing a special constable close by, told him 
to bid his brothers release the vergers, and let them 
arrest the interpreter — this the vergers, foiled as they 



Prof. Hanky's Sermon 189 

had been in the matter of my father's arrest, were 
very glad to do. So the poor interpreter, to his 
dismay, was lodged at once in one of the Bank 
prison-cells, where he could do no further harm. 



CHAPTER XVII 

GEORGE TAKES HIS FATHER TO PRISON, AND THERE 
OBTAINS SOME USEFUL INFORMATION 

By this time George had gotten my father into the 
Open square, where he was surprised to find that a 
large bonfire had been made and hghted. There had 
been nothing of the kind an hour before; the wood, 
therefore, must have been piled and lighted while 
people had been in church. He had no time at the 
moment to enquire why this had been done, but later 
on he discovered that on the Sunday morning the 
Manager of the new temple had obtained leave from 
the Mayor to have the wood piled in the square, repre- 
senting that this was Professor Hanky's contribution 
to the festivities of the day. There had, it seemed, 
been no intention of lighting it until nightfall; but it 
had accidently caught fire through the carelessness of 
a workman, much about the time when Hanky began 
to preach. No one for a moment believed that there 
had been any sinister intention, or that Professor 
Hanky when he urged the crowd to burn my father 
alive, even knew that there was a pile of wood in the 
square at all — much less that it had been lighted — 
for he could hardly have supposed that the wood had 
been got together so soon. Nevertheless both George 
and my father, when they knew all that had passed, 
congratulated themselves on the fact that my father 

190 



In Prison 191 

had not fallen into the hands of the vergers, who 
would probably have tried to utilise the accidental 
fire, though in no case is it likely they would have 
succeeded. 

As soon as they were inside the gaol, the old Master 
recognised my father. "Bless my heart — what? You 
here, again, Mr. Higgs? Why, I thought you were in 
the palace of the sun your father." 

"I wish I was," answered my father, shaking hands 
with him, but he could say no more. 

"You are as safe here as if you were," said George 
laughing, "and safer." Then turning to his grand- 
father, he said, "You have the record of Mr. Higgs's 
marks and measurements? I know you have: take 
him to his old cell; it is the best in the prison; and 
then please bring me the record." 

The old man took George and my father to the cell 
which he had occupied twenty years earlier — but I 
cannot stay to describe his feelings on finding himself 
again within it. The moment his grandfather's back 
was turned, George said to my father, "And now 
shake hands also with your son." 

As he spoke he took my father's hand and pressed 
it warmly between both his own. 

"Then you know you are my son," said my father 
as steadily as the strong emotion that mastered him 
would permit. 

"Certainly." 

"But you did not know this when I was walking 
with you on Friday?" 

"Of course not. I thought you were Professor 
Panky; if I had not taken you for one of the two 
persons named in your permit, I should have ques- 



192 Erewhon Revisited 

tioned you closely, and probably ended by throwing 
you into the Blue Pool." He shuddered as he said this. 

''But you knew who I was when you called me 
Panky in the temple?" 

''Quite so. My mother told me everything on Fri- 
day evening." 

"And that is why you tried to find me at Fair- 
mead?" 

"Yes, but where in the world were you?" 

"I was inside the Musical Bank of the town, resting 
and reading." 

George laughed, and said, "On purpose to hide?" 

"Oh no; pure chance. But on Friday evening? 
How could your mother have found out by that time 
that I was in Erewhon? Am I on my head or my 
heels?" 

"On your heels, my father, which shall take you 
back to your own country as soon as we can get you 
out of this." 

"What have I done to deserve so much good-will? 
I have done you nothing but harm." Again he was 
quite overcome. 

George patted him gently on the hand, and said, 
"You made a bet and you won it. During the very 
short time that we can be together, you shall be paid 
in full, and may heaven protect us both." 

As soon as my father could speak he said, "But 
how did your mother find out that I was in Ere- 
whon ?" 

"Hanky and Panky were dining with her, and they 
told her some things that she thought strange. She 
cross-questioned them, put two and two together, 
learned that you had got their permit out of them, saw 



In Prison 193 

that you intended to return on Friday, and concluded 
that you would be sleeping in Sunch'ston. She sent 
for me, told me all, bade me scour Sunch'ston to find 
you, intending that you should be at once escorted 
safely over the preserves by me. I found your inn, 
but you had given us the slip. I tried first Fairmead 
and then Clearwater, but did not find you till this 
morning. For reasons too long to repeat, my mother 
warned Hanky and Panky that you would be in the 
temple; whereon Hanky tried to get you into his 
clutches. Happily he failed, but if I had known what 
he was doing I should have arrested you before the 
service. I ought to have done this, but I wanted you 
to win your wager, and I shall get you safely away in 
spite of them. My mother will not like my having let 
you hear Hanky's sermon and declare yourself." 
*'You half told me not to say who I was." 
"Yes, but I was delighted when you disobeyed me." 
"I did it very badly. I never rise to great occa- 
sions, I always fall to them, but these things must 
come as they come." 

**You did it as well as it could be done, and good 
.will come of it." 

"And now," he continued, "describe exactly all that 
passed between you and the Professors. On which 
side of Panky did Hanky sit, and did they sit north 
and south or east and west? How did you get — oh 
yes, I know that — you told them it would be of no 
further use to them. Tell me all else you can." 

My father said that the Professors were sitting 
pretty well east and west, so that Hanky, who was on 
the east side, nearest tlie mountains, had Panky, who 
was on the Sunch'ston side, on his right hand. George 



194 Erewhon Revisited 

made a note of this. My father then told what the 
reader already knows, but when he came to the meas- 
urement of the boots, George said, 'Take your boots 
off," and began taking off his own. "Foot for foot," 
he said, ''we are not father and son, but brothers. 
Yours will fit me; they are less worn than mine, but 
I daresay you will not mind that." 

On this George ex abiindanti cautela knocked a nail 
out of the right boot that he had been wearing and 
changed boots with my father ; but he thought it more 
plausible not to knock out exactly the same nail that 
was missing on my father's boot. When the change 
was made, each found — or said he found — ^the other's 
boots quite comfortable. 

My father all the time felt as though he were a 
basket given to a dog. The dog had got him, was 
proud of him, and no one must try to take him away. 
The promptitude with which George took to him, the 
obvious pleasure he had in "running" him, his quick 
judgment, verging as it should towards rashness, his 
confidence that my father trusted him without reserve, 
the conviction of perfect openness that was conveyed 
by the way in which his eyes never budged from my 
father's when he spoke to him, his genial, kindly, 
manner, perfect physical health, and the air he had of 
being on the best possible terms with himself and 
every one else — the combination of all this so over- 
mastered my poor father (who indeed had been suffi- 
ciently mastered before he had been five minutes in 
George's company) that he resigned himself as grate- 
fully to being a basket, as George had cheerfully 
undertaken the task of carrying him. 

In passing I may say that George could never get 



In Prison 195 

his own boots back again, though he tried more than 
once to do so. My father always made some excuse. 
They were the only memento of George that he 
brought home with him ; I wonder that he did not ask 
for a lock of his hair, but he did not. He had the 
boots put against a wall in his bedroom, where he 
could see them from his bed, and during his illness, 
while consciousness yet remained with him, I saw his 
eyes continually turn towards them. George, in fact, 
dominated him as long as anything in this world could 
do so. Nor do I wonder; on the contrary, I love his 
memory the better ; for I too, as will appear later, have 
seen George, and whatever little jealousy I may have 
felt, vanished on my finding him almost instanta- 
neously gain the same ascendancy over me his brother, 
that he had gained over his and my father. But of 
this no more at present. Let me return to the gaol in 
Sunch'ston. 

"Tell me more," said George, ''about the Profes- 
sors." 

My father told him about the nuggets, the sale of 
his kit, the receipt he had given for the money, and 
how he had got the nuggets back from a tree, the 
position of which he described. 

"I know the tree; have you got the nuggets here?" 

"Here they are, with the receipt, and the pocket 
handkerchief marked with Hanky's name. The pocket 
handkerchief was found wrapped round some dried 
leaves that we call tea, but I have not got these with 
me." As he spoke he gave everything to George, who 
showed the utmost delight in getting possession of 
them. 



196 Erewhon Revisited 

"I suppose the blanket and the rest of the kit are 
still in the tree ?" 

''Unless Hanky and Panky have got them away, or 
some one has found them/* 

**This is not likely. I will now go to my office, but 
I will com.e back very shortly. My grandfather shall 
bring you something to eat at once. I will tell him to 
send enough for two" — which he accordingly did. 

On reaching the office, he told his next brother 
(whom he had made an under-ranger) to go to the 
tree he described, and bring back the bundle he should 
find concealed therein. *'You can go there and back," 
he said, "in an hour and a half, and I shall want the 
bundle by that time." 

The brother, whose name I never rightly caught, 
set out at once. As soon as he was gone, George took 
from a drawer the feathers and bones of quails, that 
he had shown my father on the morning when he met 
him. He divided them in half, and made them into 
two bundles, one of which he docketed, "Bones of 
quails eaten, XIX. xii. 29, by Professor Hanky, P.O. 
W.W., &c." And he labelled Panky's quail bones in 
like fashion. 

Having done this he returned to the gaol, but on his 
way he looked in at the Mayor's, and left a note say- 
ing that he should be at the gaol, where any message 
would reach him, but that he did not wish to meet 
Professors Hanky and Panky for another couple of 
hours. It was now about half-past twelve, and he 
caught sight of a crowd coming quietly out of the 
temple, whereby he knew that Hanky would soon be 
at the Mayor's house. 

Dinner was brought in almost at the moment when 



In Prison 197 

George returned to the gaol. As soon as it was over 
George said : — 

''Are you quite sure you have made no mistake 
about the way in which you got the permit out of the 
Professors?" 

''Quite sure. I told them they would not want it, 
and said I could save them trouble if they gave it me. 
They never suspected why I wanted it. Where do you 
think I may be mistaken?" 

"You sold your nuggets for rather less than a 
twentieth part of their value, and you threw in some 
curiosities, that would have fetched about half as 
much as you got for the nuggets. You say you did 
this because you wanted money to keep you going till 
you could sell some of your nuggets. This sounds 
well at first, but the sacrifice is too great to be plausible 
when considered. It looks more like a case of good 
honest manly straightforward corruption." 

"But surely you believe me?" 

"Of course I do. I believe every syllable that comes 
from your mouth, but I shall not be able to make out 
that the story was as it was not, unless I am quite 
certain what it really was." 

"It was exactly as I have told you." 

"That is enough. And now, may I tell my mother 
that you will put yourself in her, and the Mayor's, and 
my, hands, and will do whatever we tell you?" 

"I will be obedience itself — but you will not ask me 
to do anything that will make your mother or you 
think less well of me?" 

"If we tell you what you are to do, we shall not 
think any the worse of you for doing it. Then I may 
say to my mother that you will be good and give no 



198 Erewhon Revisited 

trouble — not even though we bid you shake hands 
with Hanky and Panky?" 

"I will embrace them and kiss them on both cheeks, 
if you and she tell me to do so. But what about the 
Mayor?" 

*'He has known everything, and condoned every- 
thing, these last twenty years. He will leave every- 
thing to my mother and me.'* 

"Shall I have to see him?" 

"Certainly. You must be brought up before him 
to-morrow morning.'' 

"How can I look him in the face ?" 

"As you would me, or any one else. It is under- 
stood among us that nothing happened. Things may 
have looked as though they had happened, but they 
did not happen." 

"And you are not yet quite twenty?" 

"No, but I am son to my mother — and," he added, 
"to one who can stretch a point or two in the way of 
honesty as well as other people." 

Having said this with a laugh, he again took my 
father's hand between both his, and went back to his 
office — where he set himself to think out the course he 
intended to take when dealing with the Professors. 



CHAPTER XVIII 

VRAM INVITES DR. DOWNIE AND MRS. HUMDRUM TO 

LUNCHEON A PASSAGE AT ARMS BETWEEN HER 

AND HANKY IS AMICABLY ARRANGED 

The disturbance caused by my father's outbreak 
was quickly suppressed, for George got him out of 
the temple almost immediately; it was bruited about, 
however, that the Sunchild had come down from the 
palace of the sun, but had disappeared as soon as any 
one had tried to touch him. In vain did Hanky try 
to put fresh life into his sermon; its back had been 
broken, and large numbers left the church to see what 
they could hear outside, or faiHng information, to dis- 
course more freely with one another. 

Hanky did his best to quiet his hearers when he 
found that he could not infuriate them, — 
^ "This poor man," he said, *'is already known to me, 
as one of those who have deluded themselves into be- 
lieving that they are the Sunchild. I have known of 
his so declaring himself, more than once, in the neigh- 
bourhood of Bridgeford, and others have not infre- 
quently done the same; I did not at first recognize 
him, and regret that the shock of horror his words 
occasioned me should have prompted me to suggest 
violence against him. Let this unfortunate affair pass 
from 3^our minds, and let me again urge upon you the 
claims of the Sunchild Evidence Society/' 

199 



200 Ere when Revisited 

The audience on hearing that they were to be told 
more about the Sunchild Evidence Society melted 
away even more rapidly than before, and the sermon 
fizzled out to an ignominious end quite unworthy of 
its occasion. 

About half-past twelve, the service ended, and 
Hanky went to the robing-room to take off his vest- 
ments. Yram, the Mayor, and Panky, waited for him 
at the door opposite to that through which my father 
had been taken; while waiting, Yram scribbled off 
two notes in pencil, one to Dr. Downie, and another to 
Mrs. Humdrum, begging them to come to lunch at 
once — for it would be one o'clock before they could 
reach the Mayor's. She gave these notes to the Mayor, 
and bade him bring both the invited guests along with 
him. 

The Mayor left just as Hanky was coming towards 
her. "This, Mayoress," he said with some asperity, 
"is a very serious business. It has ruined my collec- 
tion. Half the people left the temple without giving 
anything at all. You seem," he added in a tone the 
significance of which could not be mistaken, "to be 
very fond. Mayoress, of this Mr. Higgs." 

"Yes," said Yram, "I am : I always liked him, and 
I am sorry for him ; but he is not the person I am most 
sorry for at this moment — he, poor man, is not going 
to be horsewhipped within the next twenty minutes." 
And she spoke the "he" in italics. 

"I do not understand you, Mayoress." 

"My husband will explain, as soon as I have seen 
him." 

"Hanky," said Panky, "you must withdraw, and 
apologise at once." 



After Service 201 

Hanky was not slow to do this, and when he had 
disavowed everything, withdrawn everything, apolo- 
gised for everything, and eaten humble pie to Yram's 
satisfaction, she smiled graciously, and held out her 
hand, which Hanky was obliged to take. 

''And now. Professor,'* she said, "let me return to 
your remark that this is a very serious business, and 
let me also claim a woman's privilege of being listened 
to whenever she chooses to speak. I propose, then, 
that we say nothing further about this matter till after 
luncheon. I have asked Dr. Downie and Mrs. Hum- 
drum to join us " 

"Why Mrs. Humdrum?" interrupted Hanky none 
too pleasantly, for he was still furious about the duel 
that had just taken place between himself and his 
hostess. 

"My dear Professor," said Yram good-humouredly, 
"pray say all you have to say and I will continue." 

Hanky was silent. 

"I have askd," resumed Yram, "Dr. Downie and 
Mrs. Humdrum to join us, and after luncheon we can 
discuss the situation or no as you may think proper. 
Till then let us say no more. Luncheon will be over 
by two o'clock or soon after, and the banquet will not 
begin till seven, so we shall have plenty of time." 

Hanky looked black and said nothing. As for 
Panky he was morally in a state of collapse, and did 
not count. 

Hardly had they reached the Mayor's house when 
the Mayor also arrived with Dr. Downie and Mrs. 
Humdrum, both of whom had seen and recognised 
my father in spite of his having dyed his hair. Dr. 
Downie had met him at supper at Mr. Thims's rooms 



202 Erewhon Revisited 

when he had visited Bridgeford, and naturally enough 
had observed him closely. Mrs. Humdrum, as I have 
already said, had seen him more than once when he 
was in prison. She and Dr. Downie were talking 
earnestly over the strange reappearance of one whom 
they had believed long since dead, but Yram imposed 
on them the same silence that she had already imposed 
on the Professors. 

*Trofessor Hanky," said she to Mrs. Humdrum, in 
Hanky's hearing, ''is a little alarmed at my having 
asked you to join our secret conclave. He is not mar- 
ried, and does not know how well a woman can hold 
her tongue when she chooses. I should have told you 
all that passed, for I mean to follow your advice, so 
I thought you had better hear everything yourself." 

Hanky still looked black, but he said nothing. 
Luncheon was promptly served, and done justice to in 
spite of much preoccupation; for if there is one thing 
that gives a better appetite than another, it is a Sun- 
day morning's service with a charity sermon to follow. 
As the guests might not talk on the subject they 
wanted to talk about, and were in no humour to speak 
of anything else, they gave their whole attention to the 
good things that were before them, without so much 
as a thought about reserving themselves for the eve- 
ning's banquet. Nevertheless, when luncheon was 
over, the Professors were in no more genial, manage- 
able, state of mind than they had been when it began. 

When the servants had left the room, Yram said to 
Hanky, "You saw the prisoner, and he was the man 
you met on Thursday night ?" 

'^Certainly, he was wearing the forbidden dress and 



After Service 203 

he had many quails in his possession. There is no 
doubt also that he was a foreign devil/' 

At this point, it being now nearly half-past two, 
George came in, and took a seat next to Mrs. Hum- 
drum — between her and his mother — who of course 
sat at the head of the table with the Mayor opposite to 
her. On one side of the table sat the Professors, and 
on the other Dr. Downie, Mrs. Humdrum, and 
George, who had heard the last few words that Hanky 
had spoken. 



CHAPTER XIX 

A COUNCIL IS HELD AT THE MAYOR'S, IN THE COURSE 
OF WHICH GEORGE TURNS THE TABLES ON THE 
PROFESSORS 

"Now who," said Yram, "is this unfortunate crea- 
ture to be, when he is brought up to-morrow morning, 
on the charge of poaching?" 

"It is not necessary," said Hanky severely, "that he 
should be brought up for poaching. He is a foreign 
devil, and as such your son is bound to fling him with- 
out trial into the Blue Pool. Why bring a smaller 
charge when you must inflict the death penalty on a 
more serious one? I have already told you that I shall 
feel it my duty to report the matter at headquarters, 
unless I am satisfied that the death penalty has been 
inflicted." 

"Of course," said George, "we must all of us do our 
duty, and I shall not shrink from mine — but I have 
arrested this man on a charge of poaching, and must 
give my reasons; the case cannot be dropped, and it 
must be heard in public. Am I, or am I not, to have 
the sworn depositions of both you gentlemen to the 
fact that the prisoner is the man you saw with quails 
in his possession? If you can depose to this he will 
be convicted, for there can be no doubt he killed the 
birds himself. The least penalty my father can inflict 
is twelve months' imprisonment with hard labour ; and 

204 



A Council 205 

he must undergo this sentence before I can Blue-Pool 
him. 

'Then comes the question whether or no he is a 
foreign devil. I may decide this in private, but I must 
have depositions on oath before I do so, and at present 
I have nothing but hearsay. Perhaps you gentlemen 
can give me the evidence I shall require, but the case 
is one of such importance that were the prisoner 
proved never so clearly to be a foreign devil, I should 
not Blue-Pool him till I had taken the King's pleasure 
concerning him. I shall rejoice, therefore, if you gen- 
tlemen can help me to sustain the charge of poaching, 
and thus give me legal standing-ground for deferring 
action which the King might regret, and which once 
taken cannot be recalled." 

Here Yram interposed. "These points," she said, 
''are details. Should we not first settle, not what, but 
who, we shall allow the prisoner to be, when he is 
brought up to-morrow morning? Settle this, and the 
rest will settle itself. He has declared himself to be 
the Sunchild, and will probably do so again. I am 
prepared to identify him, so is Dr. Downie, so is Mrs. 
Humdrum, the interpreter, and doubtless my father. 
Others of known respectability will also do so, and his 
marks and measurements are sure to correspond quite 
sufficiently. The question is, whether all this is to be 
allowed to appear on evidence, or whether it is to be 
established, as it easily may, if we give our minds to 
it, that he is not the Sunchild." 

"Whatever else he is," said Hanky, "he must not 
be the Sunchild. He must, if the charge of poaching 
cannot be dropped, be a poacher and a foreign devil. I 
was doubtless too hasty when I said that I believed I 



2o6 Erewhon Revisited 

recognised the man as one who had more than once 
declared himself to be the Sunchild " 

"But, Hanky," interrupted Panky, "are you sure 
that you can swear to this man's being the man we met 
on Thursday night? We only saw him by firelight, 
and I doubt whether I should feel justified in swear- 
ing to him." 

"Well, well: on second thoughts I am not sure, 
Panky, but what you may be right after all; it is pos- 
sible that he may be what I said he was in my ser- 
mon." 

"I rejoice to hear you say so," said George, "for in 
this case the charge of poaching will fall through. 
There will be no evidence against the prisoner. And 
I rejoice also to think that I shall have nothing to war- 
rant me in believing him to be a foreign devil. For if 
he is not to be the Sunchild, and not to be your 
poacher, he becomes a mere monomaniac. If he apolo- 
gises for having made a disturbance in the temple, 
and promises not to offend again, a fine, and a few 
days' imprisonment, will meet the case, and he may be 
discharged." 

"I see, I see," said Hanky very angrily. "You are 
determined to get this man off if you can." 

"I shall act," said George, "in accordance with 
sworn evidence, and not otherwise. Choose whether 
you will have the prisoner to be your poacher or no : 
give me your sworn depositions one way or the other, 
and I shall know how to act. If you depose on oath 
to the identity of the prisoner and your poacher, he 
will be convicted and imprisoned. As to his being a 
foreign devil, if he is the Sunchild, of course he is one; 
but otherwise I cannot Blue-Pool him even when his 



A Council 207 

sentence is expired, without testimony deposed to me 
on oath in private, though no open trial is required. A 
case for suspicion was made out in my hearing last 
night, but I must have depositions on oath to all the 
leading facts before I can decide what my duty is. 
What will you swear to?" 

"All this," said Hanky, in a voice husky with pas- 
sion, "shall be reported to the King." 

"I intend to report every word of it ; but that is not 
the point: the question is what you gentlemen will 
swear to?" 

"Very well. I will settle it thus. We will swear 
that the prisoner is the poacher we met on Thursday 
night, and that he is also a foreign devil : his wearing 
the forbidden dress; his foreign accent; the foot- 
tracks we found in the snow, as of one coming over 
from the other side; his obvious ignorance of the 
Afforesting Act, as shown by his having lit a fire and 
making no effort to conceal his quails till our permit 
shewed him his blunder; the cock-and-bull story he 
told us about your orders, and that other story about 
his having killed a foreign devil — if these facts do not 
aatisfy you, they will satisfy the King that the pris- 
oner is a foreign devil as well as a poacher." 

"Some of these facts," answered George, **are new 
to me. How do you know that the foot-tracks were 
made by the prisoner?" 

Panky brought out his note-book and read the de- 
tails he had noted. 

"Did you examine the man's boots?" 

"One of them, the right foot; this, with the measur- 
ments, was quite enough." 

"Hardly. Please to look at both soles of my own 



2o8 Erewhon Revisited 

boots; you will find that those tracks were mine. I 
will have the prisoner's boots examined ; in the mean- 
time let me tell you that I was up at the statues on 
Thursday morning, walked three or four hundred 
yards beyond them, over ground where there was less 
snow, returned over the snow, and went two or three 
times round them, as it is the Ranger's duty to do once 
a year in order to see that none of them are beginning 
to lean." 

He showed the soles of his boots, and the Professors 
were obliged to admit that the tracks were his. He 
cautioned them as to the rest of the points on which 
they relied. Might they not be as mistaken, as they 
had just proved to be about the tracks? He could not, 
however, stir them from sticking to it that there was 
enough evidence to prove my father to be a foreign 
devil, and declaring their readiness to depose to the 
facts on oath. In the end Hanky again fiercely ac- 
cused him of trying to shield the prisoner. 

"You are quite right," said George, **and you will 
see my reasons shortly." 

"I have no doubt," said Hanky significantly, "that 
they are such as would weigh with any man of ordi- 
nary feeling." 

"I understand, then," said George, appearing to take 
no notice of Hanky's innuendo, "that you will swear 
to the facts as you have above stated them?" 

"Certainly." 

"Then kindly wait while I write them on the form 
that I have brought wdth me ; the Mayor can adminis- 
ter the oath and sign your depositions. I shall then 
be able to leave you, and proceed with getting up the 
case against the prisoner." 



A Council 209 

So saying, he went to a writing-table in another part 
of the room, and made out the depositions. 

Meanwhile the Mayor, Mrs. Humdrum, and Dr. 
Downie (who had each of them more than once vainly 
tried to take part in the above discussion) conversed 
eagerly in an undertone among themselves. Hanky 
was blind with rage, for he had a sense that he was 
going to be outwitted; the Mayor, Yram and Mrs. 
Humdrum had already seen that George thought he 
had all the trumps in his own hand but they did not 
know more. Dr. Downie was frightened, and Panky 
so muddled as to be hors de combat. 

George now rejoined the Professors, and read the 
depositions : the Mayor administered the oath accord- 
ing to Erewhonian custom; the Professors signed 
without a word, and George then handed the docu- 
ment to his father to countersign. 

The Mayor examined it, and almost immediately 
said, "My dear George, you have made a mistake; 
these depositions are on a form reserved for deponents 
who are on the point of death." 

''Alas !" answered George, "there is no help for it. I 
did my utmost to prevent their signing. I knew that 
those depositions were their own death warrant, and 
that is why, though I was satisfied that the prisoner is 
a foreign devil, I had hoped to be able to shut my eyes. 
I can now no longer do so, and as the inevitable con- 
sequence, I must Blue-Pool both the Professors be- 
fore midnight. What man of ordinary feeling would 
not under these circumstances have tried to dissuade 
them from deposing as they have done?" 

By this time the Professors had started to their feet, 
and there was a look of horrified astonishment on the 



210 Erewhon Revisited 

faces of all present, save that of George, who seemed 
quite happy. 

**What monstrous absurdity is this?" shouted 
Hanky; "do you mean to murder us?" 

"Certainly not. But you have insisted that I should 
do my duty, and I mean to do it. You gentlemen have 
now been proved to my satisfaction to have had traffic 
with a foreign devil; and under section 37 of the 
Afforesting Act, I must at once Blue-Pool any such 
persons without public trial." 

"Nonsense, nonsense, there was nothing of the kind 
on our permit, and as for trafficking with this foreign 
devil, we spoke to him, but we neither bought nor sold. 
Where is the Act?" 

"Here. On your permit you were referred to cer- 
tain other clauses not set out therein, which might be 
seen at the Mayor's office. Clause 37 is as follows : — 

"It is furthermore enacted that should any of his Ma- 
jesty's subjects be found, after examination by the Head 
Ranger, to have had traffic of any kind by way of sale or 
barter with any foreign devil, the said Ranger, on being 
satisfied that such traffic has taken place, shall forthwith, 
with or without the assistance of his under-rangers, convey 
such subjects of his Majesty to the Blue Pool, bind them, 
weight them, and fling them into it, without the formality 
of a trial, and shall report the circumstances of the case to 
his Majesty." 

"But we never bought anything from the prisoner. 
What evidence can you have of this but the word of a 
foreign devil in such straits that he would swear to 
anything?" 

"The prisoner has nothing to do with it. I am con- 
vinced by this receipt in Professor Panky's handwrit- 



A Council 211 

ing which states that he and you jointly purchased his 
kit from the prisoner, and also this bag of gold nug- 
gets worth about £ioo in silver, for the absurdly small 
sum of £4, I OS. in silver. I am further convinced by 
this handkerchief marked with Professor Hanky's 
name, in which was found a broken packet of dried 
leaves that are now at my office with the rest of the 
prisoner's kit." 

*Then we were watched and dogged," said Hanky, 
*'on Thursday evening." 

'That, sir," replied George, "is my business, not 
yours." 

Here Panky laid his arms on the table, buried his 
head in them, and burst into tears. Every one seemed 
aghast, but the Mayor, Yram, and Mrs. Humdrum 
saw that George was enjoying it all far too keenly to 
be serious. Dr. Downie was still frightened (for 
George's surface manner was Rhadamanthine) and 
did utmost to console Panky. George pounded away 
ruthlessly at his case. 

"I say nothing about your having bought quails 
from the prisoner and eaten them. As you justly re- 
marked just now, there is no object in preferring a 
smaller charge when one must inflict the death penalty 
on a more serious one. Still, Professor Hanky, these 
are bones of the quails you ate as you sate opposite the 
prisoner on the side of the fire nearest Sunch'ston; 
these are Professor Panky's bones, with which I need 
not disturb him. This is your permit, which was 
found upon the prisoner, and which there can be no 
doubt you sold him, having been bribed by the offer of 
the nuggets for " 

"Monstrous, monstrous! Infamous falsehood! 



212 Erewhon Revisited 

Who will believe such a childish trumped-up story!" 

"Who, sir, will believe anything else? You will 
hardly contend that you did not know the nuggets 
were gold, and no one will believe you mean enough to 
have tried to get this poor man's property out of him 
for a song — you knowing its value, and he not know- 
ing the same. No one will believe that you did not 
know the man to be a foreign devil, or that he could 
hoodwink two such learned Professors so cleverly as 
to get their permit out of them. Obviously he seduced 
you into selling him your permit, and — I presume be- 
cause he wanted a little of our money — ^he made you 
pay him for his kit. I am satisfied that you have not 
only had traffic with a foreign devil, but traffic of a 
singularly atrocious kind, and this being so, I shall 
Blue-Pool both of you as soon as I can get you up to 
the Pool itself. The sooner we start the better. I 
shall gag you, and drive you up in a close carriage as 
far as the road goes; from that point you can walk up, 
or be dragged up as you may prefer, but you will prob- 
ably find walking more comfortable." 

"But" said Hanky, "come what may, I must be at 
the banquet. I am set down to speak." 

"The Mayor will explain that you have been taken 
somewhat suddenly unwell." 

Here Yram, who had been talking quietly with her 
husband. Dr. Downie, and Mrs. Humdrum, motioned 
her son to silence. 

"I feared," she said, "that difficulties might arise, 
though I did not foresee how seriously they would 
afifect my guests. Let Mrs. Humdrum on our side, 
and Dr. Downie on that of the Professors, go into the 
next room and talk the matter quietly over ; let us then 



A Council 213 

see whether we cannot agree to be bound by their de- 
cision. I do not doubt but they will find some means 
of averting any catastrophe more serious — No, Pro- 
fessor Hanky, the doors are locked — than a little per- 
jury in which we shall all share and share alike." 

''Do what you like," said Hanky, looking for all the 
world like a rat caught in a trap. As he spoke he 
seized a knife from the table, whereupon George pulled 
a pair of handcuffs from his pocket and slipped them 
on to his wrists before he well knew what was being 
done to him. 

"George," said the Mayor, "this is going too far. 
Do you mean to Blue-Pool the Professors or no?" 

"Not if they will compromise. If they will be rea- 
sonable, they will not be Blue-Pooled; if they think 
they can have everything their own Vv^ay, the eels will 
be at them before morning." 

A voice was heard from the head of Panky which 
he had buried in his arms upon the table. "Co — co — 
CO — CO — compromise," it said; and the effect was so 
comic that every one except Hanky smiled. Mean- 
while Yram had conducted Dr. Downie and Mrs. 
Humdrum into an adjoining room. 



CHAPTER XX 

MRS. HUMDRUM AND DR. DOWNIE PROPOSE A COM- 
PROMISE, WHICH, AFTER AN AMENDMENT BY 
GEORGE, IS CARRIED NEM CON. 

They returned in about ten minutes, and Dr. 
Downie asked Mrs. Humdrum to say what they had 
agreed to recommend. 

"We think," said she very demurely, "that the strict 
course would be to drop the charge of poaching, and 
Blue-Pool both the Professors and the prisoner with- 
out delay. 

"We also think that the proper thing would be to 
place on record that the prisoner is the Sunchild — 
about which neither Dr. Downie nor I have a shadow 
of doubt. 

"These measures we hold to be the only legal ones, 
but at the same time we do not recommend them. We 
think it would ofiend the public conscience if it came 
to be known, as it certainly would, that the Sunchild 
was violently killed, on the very day that had seen us 
dedicate a temple in his honour, and perhaps at the 
very hour when laudatory speeches were being made 
about him at the Mayor's banquet ; we think also that 
we should strain a good many points rather than Blue- 
Pool the Professors. 

"Nothing is perfect, and Truth makes her mistakes 
like other people; when she goes wrong and reduces 

214 



The Compromise 215 

herself to such an absurdity as she has here done, those 
who love her must save her from herself, correct her, 
and rehabilitate her. 

"Our conclusion, therefore, is this : — 

'The prisoner must recant on oath his statement 
that he is the Sunchild. The interpreter must be 
squared, or convinced of his mistake. The Mayoress, 
Dr. Downie, I, and the gaoler (with the interpreter if 
we can manage him), must depose on oath that the 
prisoner is not Higgs. This must be our contribution 
to the rehabilitation of Truth. 

"The Professors must contribute as follows : They 
must swear that the prisoner is not the man they met 
with quails in his possession on Thursday night. They 
must further swear that they have one or both of them 
known him, off and on, for many years past, as a 
monomaniac with Sunchildism on the brain but other- 
wise harmless. If they will do this, no proceedings 
are to be taken against them. 

*'The Mayor's contribution shall be to reprimand the 
prisoner, and order him to repeat his recantation in 
the new temple before the Manager and Head Cashier, 
and to confirm his statement on oath by kissing the 
reliquary containing the newly found relic. 

''The Ranger and the Master of the Gaol must con- 
tribute that the prisoner's measurements, and the 
marks found on his body, negative all possibility of 
his identity with the Sunchild, and that all the hair on 
the covered as well as the uncovered parts of his body 
was found to be jet black. 

"We advise further that the prisoner should have 
his nuggets and his kit returned to him, and that the 
receipt given by the Professors together with Profes- 



2i6 Erewhon Revisited 

sor Hanky's handkerchief be given back to the Pro- 
fessors. 

"Furthermore, seeing that we should all of us like 
to have a quiet evening with the prisoner, we should 
petition the Mayor and Mayoress to ask him to meet 
all here present at dinner to-morrow evening, after his 
discharge, on the plea that Professors Hanky and 
Panky and Dr. Downie may give him counsel, con- 
vince him of his folly, and if possible free him hence- 
forth from the monomania under which he now 
suffers. 

*The prisoner shall give his word of honour, never 
to return to Erewhon, nor to encourage any of his 
countrymen to do so. After the dinner to which we 
hope the Mayoress will invite us, the Ranger, if the 
night is fair, shall escort the prisoner as far as the 
statues, whence he will find his own way home. 

*Those who are in favour of this compromise hold 
up their hands." ' 

The Mayor and Yram held up theirs. *'Will you 
hold up yours. Professor Hanky," said George, "if I 
release you?" 

"Yes," said Hanky with a gruff laugh, whereon 
George released him and he held up both his hands. 

Panky did not hold up his, whereon Hanky said, 
"Hold up your hands, Panky, can't you? We are 
really very well out of it." 

Panky, hardly lifting his head sobbed out, "I think 
we ought to have our f-f-fo-fo-four pounds ten re- 
turned to us." 

"I am afraid, sir," said George, "that the prisoner 
must have spent the greater part of this money." 

Every one smiled, indeed it was all George could do 



The Compromise 217 

to prevent himself from laughing outright. The 
Mayor brought out his purse, counted the money, and 
handed it good-humouredly to Panky, who gratefully 
received it, and said he would divide it with Hanky. 
He then held up his hands, "But," he added, turning 
to his brother Professor, "so long as I live. Hanky, I 
will never go out anywhere again with you." 

George then turned to Hanky and said, "I am 
afraid I must now trouble you and Professor Panky to 
depose on oath to the facts which Mrs. Humdrum 
and Dr. Downie propose you should swear to in open 
court to-morrow. I knew you would do so, and have 
brought an ordinary form, duly filled up, which de- 
clares that the prisoner is not the poacher you met on 
Thursday; and also, that he has been long known to 
both of you as a harmless monomaniac." 

As he spoke he brought out depositions to the above 
effect which he had just written in his office ; he shewed 
the Professors that the form was this time an innocent 
one, whereon they made no demur to signing and 
swearing in the presence of the Mayor, who attested. 

"The former depositions," said Hanky, "had better 
be destroyed at once." 

"That," said George, "may hardly be, but so long 
as you stick to what you have just sworn to, they will 
not be used against you." 

Hanky scowled, but knew that he was powerless 
and said no more. 



The knowledge of what ensued did not reach me 
from my father. George and his mother, seeing how 
ill he looked, and what a shock the events of the last 
few days had given him, resolved that he should not 



2i8 Erewhon Revisited 

know of the risk that George was about to run; they 
therefore said nothing to him about it. What I shall 
now tell, I learned on the occasion already referred to 
when I had the happiness to meet George. I am in 
some doubt whether it is more fitly told here, or when 
I come to the interview between him and me; on the 
whole, however, I suppose chronological order is least 
outraged by dealing with it here. 

As soon as the Professors had signed the second 
depositions, George said, *'I have not yet held up my 
hands, but I will hold them up if Mrs. Humdrum and 
Dr. Downie will approve of what I propose. Their 
compromise does not go far enough, for swear as we 
may, it is sure to get noised abroad, with the usual 
exaggerations, that the Sunchild has been here, and 
that he has been spirited away either by us, or by the 
sun his father. For one person whom we know of as 
having identified him, there will be five, of whom we 
know nothing, and whom we cannot square. Reports 
will reach the King sooner or later, and I shall be sent 
for. Meanwhile the Professors will be living in fear 
of intrigue on my part, and I, however unreasonably, 
shall fear the like on theirs. This should not be. I 
mean, therefore, on the day following my return from 
escorting the prisoner, to set out for the capital, see 
the King, and make a clean breast of the whole matter. 
To this end I must have the nuggets, the prisoner's kit, 
his receipt. Professor Hanky's handkerchief, and, of 
course, the two depositions just sworn to by the Pro- 
fessors. I hope and think that the King will pardon 
us all round ; but whatever he may do I shall tell him 
everything" 

Hanky was up in arms at once. "Sheer madness," 



The Compromise 219 

he exclaimed. Yram and the Mayor looked anxious; 
Dr. Downie eyed George as though he were some curi- 
ous creature, which he heard of but had never seen, 
and was rather disposed to like. Mrs. Humdrum 
nodded her head approvingly. 

"Quite right, George," said she, "tell his Majesty 
everything." 

Dr. Downie then said, "Your son, Mayoress is a 
very sensible fellow. I will go with him, and with the 
Professors — for they had better come too; each will 
hear what the other says, and we will tell the truth, the 
whole truth, and nothing but the truth. I am, as you 
know, a persona grata at Court; I will say that I ad- 
vised your son's action. The King has liked him ever 
since he was a boy, and I am not much afraid about 
what he will do. In public, no doubt we had better 
hush things up, but in private the King must be told." 

Hanky fought hard for some time, but George told 
him that it did not matter whether he agreed or no. 
"You can come," he said, "or stop away, just as you 
please. If you come, you can hear and speak; if you 
do not, you will not hear, but these two depositions 
will speak for you. Please yourself." 

"Very well," he said at last, "I suppose we had 
better go." 

Every one having now understood what his or her 
part was to be, Yram said they had better shake hands 
all round and take a couple of hours' rest before get- 
ting ready for the banquet. George said that the Pro- 
fessors did not shake hands with him very cordially, 
but the farce was gone through. When the hand- 
shaking was over, Dr. Downie and Mrs. Humdrum 



220 Erewhon Revisited 

left the house, and the Professors retired grumpily to 
their own room. 

I will say here that no harm happend either to 
George or the Professors in consequence of his having 
told the King, but will reserve particulars for my con- 
cluding chapter. 



CHAPTER XXI 

VRAM, ON GETTING RID OF HER GUESTS, GOES TO 
THE PRISON TO SEE MY FATHER 

Yram did not take the advice she had given her 
guests, but set about preparing a basket of the best cold 
dainties she could find, including a bottle of choice 
wine that she knew my father would like ; thus loaded 
she went to the gaol, which she entered by her father's 
private entrance. 

It was now about half -past four, so that much more 
must have been said and done after luncheon at the 
Mayor's than ever reached my father. The wonder is 
that he was able to collect so much. He, poor man, as 
soon as George left him, flung himself on to the bed 
that was in his cell and lay there wakeful, but not un- 
quiet, till near the time when Yram reached the gaol. 
^ The old gaoler came to tell him that she had come 
and would be glad to see him ; much as he dreaded the 
meeting there was no avoiding it, and in a few min- 
utes Yram stood before him. 

Both were agitated, but Yram betrayed less of what 
she felt than my father. He could only bow his head 
and cover his face with his hands. Yram said, "We 
are old friends ; take your hands from your face and 
let me see you. There ! That is well." 

She took his right hand between both hers, looked at 
him with eyes full of kindness, and said softly — 

221 



222 Erewhon Revisited 

"You are not much changed, but you look haggard, 
worn, and ill ; I am uneasy about you. Remember, you 
are among friends, who will see that no harm befalls 
you. There is a look in your eyes that frightens me.'* 

As she spoke she took the wine out of her basket, 
and poured him out a glass, but rather to give him 
some little thing to distract his attention, than because 
she expected him to drink it — which he could not do. 

She never asked him whether he found her altered, 
or turned the conversation ever such a little on to her- 
self ; all was for him; to sooth and comfort him, not in 
words alone, but in look, manner, and voice. My 
father knew that he could thank her best by con- 
trolling himself, and letting himself be soothed and 
comforted — at any rate so far as he could seem to be. 

Up to this time they had been standing, but now 
Yram, seeing my father calmer, said, "Enough, let us 
sit down." 

So saying she seated herself at one end of the small 
table that was in the cell, and motioned my father to 
sit opposite to her. "The light hurts you?" she said, 
for the sun was coming into the room. "Change 
places with me, I am a sun worshipper. No, we can 
move the table, and we can then see each other better." 

This done, she said, still very softly, "And now tell 
me what it is all about. Why have you come here ?" 

"Tell me first," said my father, "what befell you 
after I had been taken away. Why did you not send 
me word when you found what had happened? or 
come after me? You know I should have married you 
at once, unless they bound me in fetters." 

"I know you would ; but you remember Mrs. Hum- 
drum? Yes, I see you do. I told her everything; it 



Yram Visits My Father 223 

was she who saved me. We thought of you, but she 
saw that it would not do. As I was to marry Mr. 
Strong, the more you were lost sight of the better, but 
with George ever with me I have not been able to for- 
get you. I might have been very happy with you, but 
I could not have been happier than I have been ever 
since that short dreadful time was over. George must 
tell you the rest. I cannot do so. All is well. I love 
my husband with my whole heart and soul, and he 
loves me with his. As between him and me, he knows 
everything; George is his son, not yours; we have 
settled it so, though we both know otherwise; as be- 
tween you and me, for this one hour, here, there is no 
use in pretending that you are not George's father. I 
have said all I need say. Now, tell me what I asked 
you — Why are you here?" 

"I fear," said my father, set at rest by the sweet- 
ness of Yram's voice and manner — he told me he had 
never seen any one to compare with her except my 
mother — *'I fear, to do as much harm now as I did be- 
fore, and with as little wish to do any harm at all." 

He then told her all that the reader knows, and ex- 

^plained how he had thought he could have gone about 

the country as a peasant, and seen how she herself had 

fared, without her, or any one, even suspecting that 

he was in the country. 

"You say your wife is dead, and that she left you 
with a son — is he like George?" 

*'In mind and disposition, wonderfully; in appear- 
ance, no; he is dark and takes after his mother, and 
though he is handsome, he is not so good-looking as 
George." 



224 Erewhon Revisited 

*'No one,'* said George's mother, "ever was, or ever 
will be, and he is as good as he looks." 

"I should not have believed you if you had said he 
was not." 

*That is right. I am glad you are proud of him. 
He irradiates the lives of every one of us." 

"And the mere knowledge that he exists will irradi- 
ate the rest of mine." 

"Long may it do so. Let us now talk about this 
morning — did you mean to declare yourself?" 

"I do not know what I meant; what I most cared 
about was the doing what I thought George would 
wish to see his father do." 

"You did that; but he says he told you not to say 
who you were." 

"So he did, but I knew what he would think right. 
He was uppermost in my thoughts all the time." 

Yram smiled, and said, "George is a dangerous per- 
son; you were both of you very foolish; one as bad as 
the other." 

"I do not know. I do not know anything. It is be- 
yond me; but I am at peace about it, and hope I shall 
do the like again to-morrow before the Mayor." 

"I heartily hope you will do nothing of the kind. 
George tells me you have promised him to be good and 
to do as we bid you." 

"So I will ; but he will not tell me to say that I am 
not what I am." 

"Yes, he will, and I will tell you why. If we permit 
you to be Higgs the Sunchild, he must either throw his 
own father into the Blue Pool — which he will not do 
— or run great risk of being thrown into it himself, 
for not having Blue-Pooled a foreigner. I am afraid 



Yram Visits My Father 225 

we shall have to make you do a good deal that neither 
you nor we shall like." 

She then told him briefly of what had passed after 
luncheon at her house, and what it had been settled to 
do, leaving George to tell the details while escorting 
him towards the statues on the following evening. She 
said that every one would be so completely in every 
one else's power that there was no fear of any one's 
turning traitor. But she said nothing about George's 
intention of setting out for the capital on Wednesday 
morning to tell the whole story to the King. 

"Now," she said, when she had told him as much 
as was necessary, "be good, and do as you said you 
would." 

"I will. I will deny myself, not once, nor twice, but 
as often as is necessary. I will kiss the reliquary, and 
when I meet Hanky and Panky at your table, I will be 
sworn brother to them — so long, that is, as George is 
out of hearing; for I cannot lie well to them when he 
is listening." 

"Oh yes, you can. He will understand all about it ; 
he enjoys falsehood as well as we all do, and has the 
nicest sense of when to lie and when not to do so." 

"What gift can be more invaluable?" 

My father, knowing that he might not have another 
chance of seeing Yram alone, now changed the con- 
versation. 

"I have something," he said, "for George, but he 
must know nothing about it till after I am gone." 

As he spoke, he took from his pockets the nine small 
bags of nuggets that remained to him. 

"But this," said Yram, "being gold, is a large sum: 



226 Erewhon Revisited 

can you indeed spare it, and do you really wish George 
to have it all?" 

*'I shall be very unhappy if he does not, but he must 
know nothing about it till I am out of Erewhon." 

My father then explained to her that he was now 
very rich, and would have brought ten times as much, 
if he had known of George's existence. 

^Then," said Yram, musing, "if you are rich, I ac- 
cept and thank you heartily on his behalf. I can see a 
reason for his not knowing what you are giving him at 
present, but it is too long to tell." 

The reason was, that if George knew of this gold 
before he saw the King, he would be sure to tell him 
of it, and the King might claim it, for George would 
never explain that it was a gift from father to son; 
whereas if the King had once pardoned him, he would 
not be so squeamish as to open up the whole thing 
again with a postscript to his confession. But of this 
she said not a word. 

My father then told her of the box of sovereigns 
that he had left in his saddle-bags. ''They are coined," 
he said, *'and George will have to melt them down, but 
he will find some way of doing this. They will be 
worth rather more than these nine bags of nuggets." 

"The difficulty will be to get him to go down and 
fetch them, for it is against his oath to go far beyond 
the statues. If you could be taken faint and say you 
wanted help, he would see you to your camping ground 
without a word, but he would be angry if he found he 
had been tricked into breaking his oath in order that 
money might be given him. It would never do. Be- 
sides, there would not be time, for he must be back 
here on Tuesday night. No; if he breaks his oath he 



Yram Visits My Father 227 

must do it with his eyes open — and he will do it later 
on — or I will go and fetch the money for him myself. 
He is in love with a grand-daughter of Mrs. Hum- 
drum's, and this sum, together with what you are now 
leaving with me, will make him a well-to-do man. I 
have always been unhappy about his having any of the 
Mayor's money, and his salary was not quite enough 
for him to marry on. What can I say to thank you?" 

*Tell me, please, about Mrs. Humdrum's grand- 
daughter. You like her as a wife for George?" 

"Absolutely. She is just such another as her grand- 
mother must have been. She and George have been 
sworn lovers ever since he was ten, and she eight. The 
only drawback is that her mother, Mrs. Humdrum's 
second daughter, married for love, and there are many 
children, so that there will be no money with her ; but 
what you are leaving will make everything quite easy, 
for he will sell the gold at once. I am so glad about 
it" 

"Can you ask Mrs. Humdrum to bring her grand- 
daughter with her to-morrow evening?" 

"I am afraid not, for we shall want to talk freely at 
dinner, and she must not know that you are the Sun- 
child ; she shall come to my house in the afternoon and 
you can see her then. You will be quite happy about 
her, but of course she must not know that you are her 
father-in-law that is to be." 

"One thing more. As George must know nothing 
about the sovereigns, I must tell you how I will hide 
them. They are in a silver box, which I will bind to 
the bough of some tree close to my camp; or if I can 
find a tree with a hole in it I will drop the box into the 
hole. He cannot miss my camp ; he has only to follow 



228 Erewhon Revisited 

the stream that runs down from the pass till it gets 
near a large river, and on a small triangular patch of 
flat ground, he will see the ashes of my camp fire, a 
few yards away from the stream on his right hand as 
he descends. In whatever tree I may hide the box, I 
will strew wood ashes for some yards in a straight line 
towards it. I will then light another fire underneath, 
and bl?ze the tree with a knife that I have left at my 
camping ground. He is sure to find it." 

Yram again thanked him, and then my father, to 
change the conversation, asked whether she thought 
that George really would have Blue-Pooled the Pro- 
fessors. 

"There is no knowing," said Yram. "He is the 
gentlest creature living till some great provocation 
rouses him, and I never saw him hate and despise any 
one as he does the Professors. Much of what he said 
was merely put on, for he knew the Professors must 
yield. I do not like his ever having to throw any one 
into that horrid place, no more does he, but the Rang- 
ership is exactly the sort of thing to suit him, and 
the opening was too good to lose. I must now leave 
you, and get ready for the Mayor's banquet. We shall 
meet again to-morrow evening. Try and eat what I 
have brought you in this basket. I hope you will like 
the wine." She put out her hand, which my father 
took, and in another moment she was gone, for she 
saw a look in his face as though he would fain have 
asked her to let him once more press his lips to hers. 
Had he done this, without thinking about it, it is likely 
enough she would not have been ill pleased. But who 
can say? 

For the rest of the evening my father was left very 



Yram Visits My Father 229 

much to his own not too comfortable reflections. He 
spent part of it in posting up the notes from which, as 
well as from his own mouth, my story is in great part 
taken. The good things that Yram had left with him, 
and his pipe, which she had told him he might smoke 
quite freely, occupied another part, and by ten o'clock 
he went to bed. 



CHAPTER XXII 

MAINLY OCCUPIED WITH A VERACIOUS EXTRACT 
FROM A SUNCH'STONIAN JOURNAL 

While my father was thus wiHng away the hours 
in his cell, the whole town was being illuminated in his 
honour, and not more than a couple of hundred yards 
off, at the Mayor's banquet, he was being extolled as 
a superhuman being. 

The banquet, which was at the town hall, was in- 
deed a very brilliant affair, but the little space that is 
left me forbids my saying more than that Hanky made 
what was considered the speech of the evening, and 
betrayed no sign of ill effects from the bad quarter of 
an hour which he had spent so recently. Not a trace 
was to be seen of any desire on his part to change his 
tone as regards Sunchildism — as, for example, to 
minimize the importance of the relic, or to remind his 
hearers that though the chariot and horses had un- 
doubtedly come down from the sky and carried away 
my father and mother, yet that the earlier stage of the 
ascent had been made in a balloon. It almost seemed, 
so George told my father, as though he had resolved 
that he would speak lies, all lies, and nothing but lies. 

Panky, who was also to have spoken, was excused 
by the Mayor on the ground that the great heat and the 
excitement of the day's proceedings had quite robbed 
him of his voice. 

230 



The Sunch'stonian Version 231 

Dr. Downie had a jumping cat before his mental 
vision. He spoke quietly and sensibly, dwelling chiefly 
on the benefits that had already accrued to the king- 
dom through the abolition of the edicts against ma- 
chinery, and the great developments which he foresaw 
as probable in the near future. He held up the Sun- 
child's example, and his ethical teaching, to the imita- 
tion and admiration of his hearers, but he said nothing 
about the miraculous element in my father's career, on 
which he declared that his friend Professor Hanky 
had already so eloquently enlarged as to make further 
allusion to it superfluous. 

The reader knows what was to happen on the fol- 
lowing morning. The programme concerted at the 
Mayor's was strictly adhered to. The following ac- 
count, however, which appeared in the Sunch'ston bi- 
weekly newspaper two days after my father had left, 
was given me by George a year later, on the occasion 
of that interview to which I have already more than 
once referred. There were other accounts in other 
papers, but the one I am giving departs the least widely 
from the facts. It ran : — 

. ''The close of a disagreeable incident. — Our readers 
will remember that on Sunday last during the solemn 
inauguration of the temple now dedicated to the Sun- 
child, an individual on the front bench of those set 
apart for the public suddenly interrupted Professor 
Hanky's eloquent sermon by declaring himself to be 
the Sunchild, and saying that he had come down from 
the sun to sanctify by his presence the glorious fane 
which the piety of our fellow-citizens and others has 
erected in his honour. 

"Wild rumours obtained credence throughout the 



232 Erewhon Revisited 

congregation to the effect that this person was none 
other than the Sunchild himself, and in spite of the 
fact that his complexion and the colour of his hair 
showed this to be impossible, more than one person 
was carried away by the excitement of the moment, 
and by some few points of resemblance between the 
stranger and the Sunchild. Under the influence of this 
belief, they were preparing to give him the honour 
which they supposed justly due to him, when to the 
surprise of every one he was taken into custody by 
the deservedly popular Ranger of the King's preserves, 
and in the course of the afternoon it became generally 
known that he had been arrested on the charge of be- 
ing one of a gang of poachers who have been known 
for some time past to be making such havoc among the 
quails on the preserves. 

"This offence, at all times deplored by those who 
desire that his Majesty shall enjoy good sport when he 
honours us with a visit, is doubly deplorable during 
the season when, on the higher parts of the preserves, 
the young birds are not yet able to shift for them- 
selves; the Ranger, therefore, is indefatigable in his 
efforts to break up the gang, and with this end in view, 
for the last fortnight has been out night and day on 
the remoter sections of the forest — little suspecting 
that the marauders would venture so near Sunch'ston 
as it now seems they have done. It is to his extreme 
anxiety to detect and punish these miscreants that we 
must ascribe the arrest of a man, who, however 
foolish, and indeed guilty, he is in other respects, is 
innocent of the particular crime imputed to him. The 
circumstances that led to his arrest have reached us 



The Sunch'stonian Version 233 

from an exceptionally well-informed source, and are 
as follows : — 

"Our distinguished guests, Professors Hanky and 
Panky, both of them justly celebrated archaeologists, 
had availed themselves of the opportunity afforded 
them by their visit to Sunch'ston, to inspect the mys- 
terious statues at the head of the stream that comes 
down near this city, and which have hitherto baffled 
all those who have tried to ascertain their date and 
purpose. 

"On their descent after a fatiguing day the Profes- 
sors were benighted, and lost their way. Seeing the 
light of a small fire among some trees near them, they 
made towards it, hoping to be directed rightly, and 
found a man, respectably dressed, sitting by the fire 
with several brace of quails beside him, some of them 
plucked. Believing that in spite of his appearance, 
which would not have led them to suppose that he was 
a poacher, he must unquestionably be one, they hur- 
riedly enquired their way, intending to leave him as 
soon as they had got their answer; he, however, at- 
tacked them, or made as though he would do so, and 
said he would show them a way which they should be 
in no fear of losing, whereon Professor Hanky, with 
a well-directed blow, felled him to the ground. The 
two Professors, fearing that other poachers might 
come to his assistance, made off as nearly as they could 
guess in the direction of Sunch'ston. When they had 
gone a mile or two onward at haphazard, they sat 
down under a large tree, and waited till day began to 
break; they then resumed their joumay, and before 
long struck a path which led them to a spot from 
which they could see the towers of the new temple. 



234 Erewhon Revisited 

"Fatigued though they were, they waited before 
taking the rest of which they stood much in need, till 
they had reported their adventure at the Ranger's of- 
fice. The Ranger was still out on the preserves, but 
immediately on his return on Saturday morning he 
read the description of the poacher's appearance and 
dress, about which last, however, the only remarkable 
feature was that it was better than a poacher might be 
expected to possess, and gave an air of respectability 
to the wearer that might easily disarm suspicion. 

"The Ranger made enquiries at all the inns in 
Sunch'ston, and at length succeeded in hearing of a 
stranger who appeared to correspond with the poacher 
whom the Professors had seen; but the man had 
already left, and though the Ranger did his best to 
trace him he did not succeed. On Sunday morning, 
however, he observed the prisoner, and found that he 
answered the description given by the Professors; he 
therefore arrested him quietly in the temple, but told 
him that he should not take him to prison till the ser- 
vice was over. The man said he would come quietly 
inasmuch as he should easily be able to prove his in- 
nocence. In the meantime, however, he professed the 
utmost anxiety to hear Professor Hanky's sermon, 
which he said he believed would concern him nearly. 
The Ranger paid no attention to this, and was as much 
astounded as the rest of the congregation were, when 
immediately after one of Professor Hanky's most elo- 
quent passages, the man started up and declared him- 
self to be the Sunchild. On this the Ranger took him 
away at once, and for the man's own protection hur- 
ried him off to prison. 

"Professor Hanky was so much shocked at such 



The Sunch'stonian Version 235 

outrageous conduct, that for the moment he failed to 
recognise the offender; after a few seconds, however, 
he grasped the situation, and knew him to be one who 
on previous occasions, near Bridgeford, had done what 
he was now doing. It seems that he is notorious in 
the neighbourhood of Bridgeford, as a monomaniac 
who is so deeply impressed with the beauty of the 
Sunchild's character — and we presume also of his own 
— as to believe that he is himself the Sunchild. 

"Recovering almost instantly from the shock the 
interruption had given him, the learned Professor 
calmed his hearers by acquainting them with the facts 
of the case, and continued his sermon to the delight 
of all who heard it. We should say, however, that the 
gentleman who twenty years ago instructed the Sun- 
child in the Erewhonian language, was so struck with 
some few points of resemblance between the stranger 
and his former pupil, that he acclaimed him, and was 
removed forcibly by the vergers. 

''On Monday morning the prisoner was brought up 
before the Mayor. We cannot say whether it was the 
sobering effect of prison walls, or whether he had been 
drinking before he entered the temple, and had now 
had time enough to recover himself — at any rate for 
some reason or other he was abjectly penitent when his 
case came on for hearing. The charge of poaching 
was first gone into, but was immediately disposed of 
by the evidence of tlie two Professors, who stated that 
the prisoner bore no resemblance to the poacher they 
had seen, save that he was about the same height and 
age, and was respectably dressed. 

"The charge of disturbing the congregation by de- 
claring himself the Sunchild was then proceeded with, 



236 Erewhon Revisited 

and unnecessary as it may appear to be, it was thought 
advisable to prevent all possibility of the man's asser- 
tion being accepted by the ignorant as true, at some 
later date, when those who could prove its falsehood 
were no longer living. The prisoner, therefore, was 
removed to his cell, and there measured by the Master 
of the Gaol, and the Ranger in the presence of the 
Mayor, who attested the accuracy of the measure- 
ments. Not one single one of them corresponded with 
those recorded of the Sunchild himself, and a few 
marks such as moles, and permanent scars on the Sun- 
child's body were not found on the prisoner's. Further- 
more the prisoner was shaggy-breasted, with much 
coarse jet black hair on the fore-arms and from the 
knees downwards, whereas the Sunchild had little hair- 
save on his head, and what little there was, was fine, 
and very light in colour. 

"Confronted with these discrepancies, the gentle- 
man who had taught the Sunchild our language was 
convinced of his mistake, though he still maintained 
that there was some superficial likeness between his 
former pupil and the prisoner. Here he was con- 
firmed by the Master of the Gaol, the Mayoress, Mrs. 
Humdrum, and Professors Hanky and Panky, who all 
of them could see what the interpreter meant, but de- 
nied that the prisoner could be mistaken for the Sun- 
child for more than a few seconds. No doubt the 
prisoner's unhappy delusion has been fostered, if not 
entirely caused, by his having been repeatedly told that 
he was like the Sunchild. The celebrated Dr. Downie, 
who well remembers the Sunchild, was also examined, 
and gave his evidence with so much convincing detail 
as to make it unnecessary to call further witnesses. 



The Sunch'stonian Version 237 

*'It having been thus once for all officially and au- 
thoritatively placed on record that the prisoner was 
not the Sunchild, Professors Hanky and Panky then 
identified him as a well known monomaniac on the 
subject of Sunchildism, who in other respects was 
harmless. We withhold his name and place of abode, 
out of consideration for the well known and highly 
respectable family to which he belongs. The prisoner 
admitted with much contrition that he had made a dis- 
turbance in the temple, but pleaded that he had been 
carried away by the eloquence of Professor Hanky; 
he promised to avoid all like offence in future, and 
threw himself on the mercy of the court. 

"The Mayor, unwilling that Sunday's memorable 
ceremony should be the occasion of a serious punish- 
ment to any of those who took part in it, reprimanded 
the prisoner in a few severe but not unkindly words, 
inflicted a fine of forty shillings, and ordered that the 
prisoner should be taken directly to the temple, where 
he should confess his folly to the Manager and Head 
Cashier, and confirm his words by kissing the reliquary 
in which the newly found relic has been placed. The 
.prisoner being unable to pay the fine, some of the ladies 
and gentlemen in court kindly raised the amount 
amongst them, in pity for the poor creature's obvious 
contrition, rather than see him sent to prison for a 
month in default of payment. 

"The prisoner was then conducted to the temple, 
followed by a considerable number of people. Strange 
to say, in spite of the overwhelming evidence that they 
had just heard, some few among the followers, whose 
love of the marvellous overpowered their reason, still 
maintained that the prisoner was the Sunchild. Noth- 



238 Erewhon Revisited 

ing could be more decorous than the prisoner's be- 
haviour when, after hearing the recantation that was 
read out to him by the Manager, he signed the docu- 
ment with his name and address, which we again with- 
hold, and kissed the reliquary in confirmation of his 
words. 

'The Mayor then declared the prisoner to be at 
liberty. When he had done so he said, 1 strongly urge 
you to place yourself under my protection for the 
present, that you may be freed from the impertinent 
folly and curiosity of some whose infatuation might 
lead you from that better mind to which I believe you 
are now happily restored. I wish you to remain for 
some few hours secluded in the privacy of my own 
study, where Dr. Downie and the two excellent Pro- 
fessors will administer that ghostly counsel to you, 
which will be likely to protect you from any return of 
your unhappy delusion.' 

'The man humbly bowed assent, and was taken by 
the Mayor's younger sons to the Mayor's own house, 
where he was duly cared for. About midnight, when 
all was quiet, he was conducted to the outskirts of the 
town towards Clearwater, and furnished with enough 
money to provide for his more pressing necessities till 
he could reach some relatives who reside three or four 
days' walk down on the road towards the capital. He 
desired the man who accompanied him to repeat to the 
Mayor his heartfelt thanks for the forbearance and 
generosity with which he had been treated. The re- 
membrance of this, he said, should be ever present 
with him, and he was confident would protect him if 
his unhappy monomania shewed any signs of return- 
ing. 



The Sunch'stonian Version 239 

"Let us now, however, remind our readers that the 
poacher who threatened Professors Hanky and 
Panky's life on Thursday evening last is still at large. 
He is evidently a man of desperate character, and it is 
to be hoped that our fellow-citizens will give imme- 
diate information at the Ranger's office if they see any 
stranger in the neighbourhood of the preserves whom 
they may have reasonable grounds for suspecting. 

''PS. — As we are on the point of going to press we 
learn that a dangerous lunatic, who has been for some 
years confined in the Clearwater asylum, succeeded in 
escaping on the night of Wednesday last, and it is 
surmised with much probability, that this was the man 
who threatened the two Professors on Thursday eve- 
ning. His being alone, his having dared to light a fire, 
probably to cook quails which he had been driven to 
kill from stress of hunger, the respectability of his 
dress, and the fury with which he would have attacked 
the two Professors single-handed, but for Professor 
Hanky's presence of mind in giving him a knock-down 
blow, all point in the direction of thinking that he was 
no true poacher, but — what is even more dangerous — 
a madman at large. We have not received any par- 
ticulars as to the man's appearance, nor the clothes he 
Viras wearing, but we have little doubt that these will 
confirm the surmise to which we now give publicity. 
If it is correct it becomes doubly incumbent on all our 
fellow-citizens to be both on the watch, and on their 
guard. 

''We may add that the man was fully believed to 
have taken the direction towards the capital ; hence no 
attempts were made to look for him in the neighbour- 



240 Erewhon Revisited 

hood of Sunch'ston, until news of the threatened at- 
tack on the Professors led the keeper of the asylum to 
feel confident that he had hitherto been on a wrong 
scent." 



CHAPTER XXIII 

MY FATHER IS ESCORTED TO THE MAYOR^S HOUSE, 
AND IS INTRODUCED TO A FUTURE DAUGHTER-IN- 
LAW 

My father said he was followed to the Mayor's 
house by a good many people, whom the Mayor's sons 
in vain tried to get rid of. One or two of these still 
persisted in saying he was the Sunchild — whereon an- 
other said, "But his hair is black." 

"Yes," was the answer, "but a man can dye his hair, 
can he not? look at his blue eyes and his eye-lashes?" 

My father was doubting whether he ought not to 
again deny his identity out of loyalty to the Mayor 
and Yram, when George's next brother said, "Pay no 
attention to them, but step out as fast as you can." 
This settled the matter, and in a few minutes they were 
at the Mayor's, where the young men took him into 
the study; the elder said with a smile, "We should like 
to stay and talk to you, but my mother said we were 
not to do so." Whereon they left him much to his 
regret, but he gathered rightly that they had not been 
officially told who he was, and were to be left to think 
what they liked, at any rate for the present. 

In a few minutes the Mayor entered, and going 
straight up to my father shook him cordially by the 
hand. 

"I have brought you this morning's paper," said he. 

241 



242 Erewhon Revisited 

"You will find a full report of Professor Hanky's ser- 
mon, and of the speeches at last night's banquet. You 
see they pass over your little interruption with hardly 
a word, but I dare say they will have made up their 
minds about it all by Thursday's issue." 

He laughed as he produced the paper — ^which my 
father brought home with him, and without which I 
should not have been able to report Hanky's sermon as 
fully as I have done. But my father could not let 
things pass over thus lightly. 

"I thank you," he said, ''but I have much more to 
thank you for, and know not how to do it.'* 

*'Can you not trust me to take everything as said?" 

"Yes, but I cannot trust myself not to be haunted if 
I do not say — or at any rate try to say — some part of 
what I ought to say." 

"Very well; then I will say something myself. I 
have a small joke, the only one I ever made, which I 
inflict periodically upon my wife. You, and I sup- 
pose George, are the only two other people in the world 
to whom it can ever be told ; let me see, then, if I can- 
not break the ice with it. It is this. Some men have 
twin sons; George in this topsy turvey world of ours 
has twin fathers — you by luck, and me by cunning. I 
see you smile ; give me your hand." 

My father took the Mayor's hand between both his 
own. "Had I been in your place," he said, "I should 
be glad to hope that I might have done as you did." 

"And I," said the Mayor, more readily than might 
have been expected of him, "fear that if I had been in 
yours — I should have made it the proper thing for you 
to do. There! The ice is well broken, and now for 
business. You will lunch with us, and dine in the 



At the Mayor's House 243 

evening. I have given it out that you are of good 
family, so there is nothing odd in this. At lunch you 
will not be the Sunchild, for my younger children will 
be there ; at dinner all present will know who you are, 
so we shall be free as soon as the servants are out of 
the room. 

"I am sorry, but I must send you away with George 
as soon as the streets are empty — say at midnight — 
for the excitement is too great to allow of your stay- 
ing longer. We must keep your rug and the things 
you cook with, but my wife will find you what will 
serve your turn. There is no moon, so you and George 
will camp out as soon as you get well on to the pre- 
serves ; the weather is hot, and you will neither of you 
take any harm. To-morrow by mid-day you will be 
at the statues, where George must bid you good-bye, 
for he must be at Sunch'ston to-morrow night. You 
will doubtless get safely home; I wish with all my 
heart that I could hear of your having done so, but 
this, I fear, may not be." 

"So be it," replied my father, *'but there is some- 
thing I should yet say. The Mayoress has no doubt 
told you of some gold, coined and uncoined, that I am 
leaving for George. She will also have told you that 
I am rich; this being so, I should have brought him 
much more, if I had known that there was any such 
person. You have other children; if you leave him 
anything, you will be taking it away from your own 
flesh and blood; if you leave him nothing, it will be a 
slur upon him. I must therefore send you enough 
gold to provide for George as your other children will 
be provided for; you can settle it upon him at once, 
and make it clear that the settlement is instead of pro- 



244 Erewhon Revisited 

vision for him by will. The difficulty is in the getting 
the gold into Erewhon, and until it is actually here, he 
must know nothing about it." 

I have no space for the discussion that followed. In 
the end it was settled that George was to have £2000 
in gold, which the Mayor declared to be too much, and 
my father too little. Both, however, were agreed that 
Erewhon would before long be compelled to enter into 
relations with foreign countries, in which case the 
value of gold would decline so much as to make £2000 
worth little more than it would be in England. The 
Mayor proposed to buy land with it, which he would 
hand over to George as a gift from himself, and this 
my father at once acceded to. All sorts of questions 
such as will occur to the reader were raised and settled, 
but I must beg him to be content with knowing that 
everything was arranged with the good sense that two 
such men were sure to bring to bear upon it. 

The getting the gold into Erewhon was to be man- 
aged thus. George was to know nothing, but a 
promise was to be got from him that at noon on the 
following New Year's day, or whatever day might be 
agreed upon, he would be at the statues, where either 
my father or myself would meet him, spend a couple 
of hours with him, and then return. Whoever met 
George was to bring the gold as though it were for 
the Mayor, and George could be trusted to be human 
enough to bring it down, when he saw that it would 
be left where it was if he did not do so. 

**He will kick a good deal," said the Mayor, "at 
first, but he will come round in the end.'* 

Luncheon was now announced. My father was 
feeling faint and ill; more than once during the fore- 



At the Mayor's House 245 

noon he had had a return of the strange giddiness and 
momentary loss of memory which had already twice 
attacked him, but he had recovered in each case so 
quickly that no one had seen he was unwell. He, poor 
man, did not yet know what serious brain exhaustion 
these attacks betokened, and finding himself in his 
usual health as soon as they passed away, set them 
down as simply effects of fatigue and undue excite- 
ment. 

George did not lunch with the others. Yram ex- 
plained that he had to draw up a report which would 
occupy him till dinner time. Her three other sons, and 
her three lovely daughters, were there. My father was 
delighted with all of them, for they made friends with 
him at once. He had feared that he would have been 
disgraced in their eyes, by his having just come from 
prison, but whatever they may have thought, no trace 
of anything but a little engaging timidity on the girls* 
part was to be seen. The two elder boys — or rather 
young men, for they seemed fully grown, though, like 
George, not yet bearded — treated him as already an 
old acquaintance, while the youngest, a lad of four- 
teen, walked straight up to him, put out his hand, and 
said, *'How do you do, sir?" with a pretty blush that 
went straight to my father's heart. 

'These boys,'' he said to Yram aside, "who have 
nothing to blush for — see how the blood mantles into 
their young cheeks, while I, who should blush at be- 
ing spoken to by them, cannot do so." 

''Do not talk nonsense," said Yram, with mock se- 
verity. 

But it was no nonsense to my poor father. He w^as 
awed at the goodness and beauty with which he found 



246 Erewhon Revisited 

himself surrounded. His thoughts were too full of 
what had been, what was, and what was yet to be, to 
let him devote himself to these young people as he 
would dearly have liked to do. He could only look at 
them, wonder at them, fall in love with them, and 
thank heaven that George had been brought up in such 
a household. 

When luncheon was over, Yram said, "I will now 
send you to a room where you can lie down and go 
to sleep for a few hours. You will be out late to- 
night, and had better rest while you can. Do you 
remember the drink you taught us to make of corn 
parched and ground ? You used to say you liked it. A 
cup shall be brought to your room at about five, for you 
must try and sleep till then, li you notice a little box 
on the dressing-table of your room, you will open it 
or no as you like. About half-past five there will be a 
visitor, whose name you can guess, but I shall not let 
her stay long with you. Here comes the servant to 
take you to your room." On this she smiled, and 
turned somewhat hurriedly away. 

My father on reaching his room went to the dress- 
ing-table, where he saw a small unpretending box, 
which he immediately opened. On the top was a paper 
with the words, "Look — say nothing — forget." Be- 
neath this was some cotton wool, and then — the two 
buttons and the lock of his own hair, that he had 
given Yram when he said good-bye to her. 

The ghost of the lock that Yram had then given 
him rose from the dead, and smote him as with a 
whip across the face. On what dust-heap had it not 
been thrown how many long years ago ? Then she had 
never forgotten him? to have been remembered all 



At the Mayor's House 247 

these years by such a woman as that, and never to 
have heeded it — never to have found out what she was 
though he had seen her day after day for months. Ah ! 
but she was then still budding. That was no excuse. 
If a loveable woman — aye, or any woman — has loved 
a man, even though he cannot marry her, or even wish 
to do so, at any rate let him not forget her — and he 
had forgotten Yram as completely until the last few 
days, as though he had never seen her. He took her 
little missive, and under "Look," he wrote, "I have;'* 
under ''Say nothing,'^ '1 will;" under "forget," 
"never." "And I never shall," he said to himself, as 
he replaced the box upon the table. He then lay down 
to rest upon the bed, but he could get no sleep. 

When the servant brought him his imitation coffee 
— an imitation so successful that Yram made him a 
packet of it to replace the tea that he must leave be- 
hind him — he rose and presently came downstairs into 
the drawing-room, where he found Yram and Mrs. 
Humdrum's grand-daughter, of whom I will say 
nothing, for I have never seen her, and know noth- 
ing about her, except that my father found her a 
sweet-looking girl, of graceful figure and very attrac- 
tive expression. He was quite happy about her, but 
she was too young and shy to make it possible for him 
to do more than admire her appearance, and take 
Yram's word for it that she was as good as she looked. 



CHAPTER XXIV 

AFTER DINNER, DR. DOWNIE AND THE PROFESSORS 
WOULD BE GLAD TO KNOW WHAT IS TO BE DONE 
ABOUT SUNCHILDISM 

It was about six when George's fiancee left the 
house, and as soon as she had done so, Yram began to 
see about the rug and the best substitutes she could 
find for the billy and pannikin. She had a basket 
packed with all that my father and George would want 
to eat and drink while on the preserves, and enough 
of everything, except meat, to keep my father going 
till he could reach the shepherd's hut of which I have 
already spoken. Meat would not keep, and my father 
could get plenty of flappers — i.e. ducks that cannot yet 
fly — when he was on the river-bed down below. 

The above preparations had not been made very 
long before Mrs. Humdrum arrived, followed pres- 
ently by Dr. Downie and in due course by the Pro- 
fessors, who were still staying in the house. My 
father remembered Mrs. Humdrum's good honest 
face, but could not bring Dr. Downie to his recollec- 
tion till the Doctor told him when and where they had 
met, and then he could only very uncertainly recall 
him, though he vowed that he could now do so per- 
fectly well. 

"At any rate," said Hanky, advancing towards him 
with his best Bridgeford manner, "you will not have 

248 



What About Sunchildism? 249 

forgotten meeting my brother Professor and myself." 

**It has been rather a forgetting sort of a morning," 
said my father demurely, "but I can remember that 
much, and am delighted to renew my acquaintance 
with both of you.'* 

As he spoke he shook hands with both Professors. 

George was a little late, but when he came, dinner 
was announced. My father sat on Yram's right-hand, 
Dr. Downie on her left. George was next my father, 
with Mrs. Humdrum opposite to him. The Professors 
sat one on either side of the Mayor. During dinner 
the conversation turned almost entirely on my father's 
flight, his narrow escape from drowning, and his 
adventures on his return to England; about these last 
my father was very reticent, for he said nothing about 
his book, and antedated his accession of wealth by 
some fifteen years, but as he walked up towards the 
statues with George he told him everything. 

My father repeatedly tried to turn the conversation 
from himself, but Mrs. Humdrum and Yram wanted 
to know about Nna Haras, as they persisted in calling 
my mother — how she endured her terrible experiences 
in the balloon, when she and my father were married, 
all about my unworthy self, and England generally. 
No matter how often he began to ask questions about 
the Nosnibors and other old acquaintances, both the 
ladies soon went back to his own adventures. He suc- 
ceeded, however, in learning that Mr. Nosnibor was 
dead, and Zulora, an old maid of the most unattractive 
kind, who had persistently refused to accept Sun- 
childism, while Mrs. Nosnibor was the recipient of 
honours hardly inferior to those conferred by the 
people at large on my father and mother, with whom, 



250 Erewhon Revisited 

indeed, she believed herself to have frequent inter- 
views by way of visionary revelations. So intolerable 
were these revelations to Zulora, that a separate 
establishment had been provided for her George said 
to my father quietly — "Do you know I begin to think 
that Zulora must be rather a nice person." 

*Terhaps," said my father grimly, ''but my wife 
and I did not find it out." 

When the ladies left the room, Dr. Downie took 
Yram's seat, and Hanky Dr. Downie's; the Mayor 
took Mrs. Humdrum's, leaving my father, George, 
and Panky, in their old places. Almost immediatel}/, 
Dr. Downie said, ''And now, Mr. Higgs, tell us, as a 
man of the world, what we are to do about Sun- 
childism ?" 

My father smiled at this. "You know, my dear sir, 
as well as I do, that the proper thing would be to put 
me back in prison, and keep me there till you can send 
me down to the capital. You should eat your oaths of 
this morning, as I would eat mine ; tell every one here 
who I am ; let them see that my hair has been dyed ; 
get all who knew me when I was here before to come 
and see me; appoint an unimpeachable committee to 
examine the record of my marks and measurements, 
and compare it with those of my own body. You 
should let me be seen in every town at which I lodged 
on my way down, and tell people that you had made 
a mistake. When you get to the capital, hand me over 
to the King's tender mercies and say that our oaths 
were only taken this morning to prevent a ferment in 
the town. I will play my part very willingly. The 
King can only kill me, and I should die like a gentle- 
man." 



What About Sunchildism? 251 

*'They will not do it," said George quietly to my 
father, **and I am glad of it." 

He was right. *This," said Dr. Downie, ''is a 
counsel of perfection. Things have gone too far, and 
we are flesh and blood. What would those who in 
your country come nearest to us Musical Bank Man- 
agers do if they found they had made such a mistake 
as we have, and dared not own it?" 

*'Do not ask me," said my father; *'the story is too 
long, and too terrible." 

"At any rate, then, tell us what you would have us 
do that is within our reach." 

"I have done you harm enough, and if I preach, as 
likely as not I shall do more." 

Seeing, however, that Dr, Downie was anxious to 
hear what he thought, my father said — 

'Then I must tell you. Our religion sets before us 
an ideal which we all cordially accept, but it also tells 
us of marvels like your chariot and horses, which we 
most of us reject. Our best teachers insist on the 
ideal, and keep the marvels in the background. If they 
could say outright that our age has outgrown them, 
they would say so, but this they may not do ; neverthe 
less they contrive to let their opinions be sufficiently 
well known, and their hearers are content with this. 

"We have others who take a very different course, 
but of these I will not speak. Roughly, then, if you 
cannot abolish me altogether, make me a peg on which 
to hang all your own best ethical and spiritual con- 
ceptions. If you will do this, and wriggle out of that 
wretched relic, with that not less wretched picture — if 
you will make me out to be much better and abler tlian 
I was, or ever shall be, Sunchildism may serve your 



252 Erewhon Revisited 

turn for many a long year to come. Otherwise it will 
tumble about your heads before you think it will. 

"Am I to go on or stop?" 

*'Go on," said George softly That was enough for 
my father, so on he went. 

"You are already doing part of what I wish. I was 
delighted with the two passages I heard on Sunday, 
from what you call the Sunchild's Sayings. I never 
said a word of either passage; I wish I had; I wish 
I could say anything half so good. And I have read 
a pamphlet by President Gurgoyle, which I liked ex- 
tremely ; but I never said what he says I did. Again, I 
wish I had. Keep to this sort of thing, and I will \>q 
as good a Sunchildist as any of you. But you must 
bribe some thief to steal that relic, and break it up to 
mend the roads with ; and — for I believe that here as 
elsewhere fires sometimes get lighted through the 
carelessness of a workman — set the most careless 
workman you can find to do a plumbing job near that 
picture.'' 

Hanky looked black at this, and George trod lightly 
on my father's toe, but he told me that my father's 
face was innocence itself. 

"These are hard sayings," said Dr. Downie. 

"I know they are," replied my father, "and I do not 
like saying them, but there is no royal road to unlearn- 
ing, and you have much to unlearn. Still, you Musical 
Bank people bear witness to the fact that beyond the 
kingdoms of this world there is another, within which 
the writs of this world's kingdoms do not run. This 
is the great service which our church does for us in 
England, and hence many of us uphold it, though we 
have no sympathy with the party now dominant within 



What About Sunchildism? 253 

it. 'Better,' we think, 'a corrupt church than none at 
all/ Moreover, those who in my country would step 
into the church's shoes are as corrupt as the church, 
and more exacting. They are also more dangerous, 
for the masses distrust the church, and are on their 
guard against aggression, whereas they do not suspect 
the doctrinaires and faddists, who, if they could, 
would interfere in every concern of our lives. 

*Tet me return to yourselves. You Musical Bank 
Managers are very much such a body of men as your 
country needs — but when I was here before you had 
no figurehead; I have unwittingly supplied you with 
one, and it is perhaps because you saw this, that you 
good people of Bridge ford took up with me. Sun- 
childism is still young and plastic; if you will let the 
cock-and-bull stories about me tacitly drop, and invent 
no new ones, beyond saying what a delightful person 
I was, I really cannot see why I should not do for you 
as well as any one else. 

'There. What I have said is nine-tenths of it 
rotten and wrong, but it is the most practicable rotten 
and wrong that I can suggest, seeing into what a 
rotten and wrong state of things you have drifted. 
And now, Mr. Mayor, do you not think we may join 
the Mayoress and Mrs. Humdrum?" 

*'As you please, Mr. Higgs," answered the Mayor. 

'Then let us go, for I have said too much already, 
and your son George tells me that we must be starting 
shortly." 

As they were leaving the room Panky sidled up to 
my father and said, 'There is a point, Mr. Higgs, 
which you can settle for me, though I feel pretty cer- 



254 Erewhon Revisited 

tain how you will settle it. I think that a corruption 
has crept into the text of the very beautiful " 

At this moment, as my father, who saw what was 
coming, was wondering what in the world he could 
say, George came up to him and said, *'Mr. Higgs, my 
mother wishes me to take you down into the store- 
room, to make sure that she has put everything for 
you as you would like it." On this my father said he 
would return directly and answer what he knew would 
be Panky's question. 

When Yram had shewn what she had prepared — all 
of it, of course, faultless — she said, *'And now, Mr. 
Higgs, about our leave-taking. Of course we shall 
both of us feel much. I shall; I know you will; 
George will have a few more hours with you than the 
rest of us, but his time to say good-bye will come, and 
it will be painful to both of you. I am glad you came 
— I am glad you have seen George, and George you, 
and that you took to one another. I am glad my hus- 
band has seen you; he has spoken to me about you 
very warmly, for he has taken to you much as George 
did. I am very, very glad to have seen you myself, 
and to have learned what became of you — and of your 
wife. I know you wish well to all of us; be sure that 
we all of us wish most heartily well to you and yours. 
I sent for you and George, because I could not say all 
this unless we were alone ; it is all I can do," she said, 
with a smile, **to say it now." 

Indeed it was, for the tears were in her eyes all the 
time, as they were also in my father's. 

"Let this," continued Yram, ''be our leave-taking — 
for we must have nothing like a scene upstairs. Just 
shake hands with us all, say the usual conventional 



What About Sunchildism? 255 

things, and make it as short as you can; but I could 
not bear to send you away without a few warmer 
words than I could have said when others were in the 



''May heaven bless you and yours," said my father, 
"for ever and ever." 

'That will do," said George gently. "Now, both of 
you shake hands, and come upstairs with me." 



When all three of them had got calm, for George 
had been moved almost as much as his father and 
mother, they went upstairs, and Panky came for his 
answer. "You are very possibly right," said my 
father — "the version you hold to be corrupt is the one 
in common use amongst ourselves, but it is only a 
translation, and very possibly only a translation of a 
translation, so that it may perhaps h^ve been corrupted 
before it reached us." 

"That," said Panky, "will explain everything," and 
he went contentedly away. 

My father talked a little aside with Mrs. Humdrum 
about her grand-daughter and George, for Yram had 
told him that she knew all about the attachment, and 
then George, who saw that my father found the 
greatest difficulty in maintaining an outward calm, 
said, "Mr. Higgs, the streets are empty; we had better 

go." 

My father did as Yram had told him ; shook hands 
with every one, said all that was usual and proper as 
briefly as he could, and followed George out of the 
room. The Mayor saw them to the door, and saved 
my father from embarrassment by saying, "Mr. 
Higgs, you and I understand one another too well to 



256 Erewhon Revisited 

make it necessary for us to say so. Good-bye to you, 
and may no ill befall you ere you get home." 

My father grasped his hand in both his own. 
"Again," he said, "I can say no more than that I thank 
you from the bottom of my heart." 

As he spoke he bowed his head, and went out with 
George into the night. 



CHAPTER XXV 

GEORGE ESCORTS MY FATHER TO THE STATUES; 
THE TWO THEN PART 

The streets were quite deserted as George had said 
they would be, and very dark, save for an occasional 
oil lamp. 

''As soon as we can get within the preserves," said 
George, **we had better wait till morning. I have a 
rug for myself as well as for you.'^ 

"I saw you had two," answered my father; "you 
must let me carry them both ; the provisions are much 
the heavier load." 

George fought as hard as a dog would do, till my 
father said that they must not quarrel during the very 
short time they had to be together. On this George 
gave up one rug meekly enough, and my father yielded 
about the basket and the other rug. 
^ It was about half -past eleven when they started, 
and it was after one before they reached the preserves. 
For the first mile from the town they were not much 
hindered by the darkness, and my father told George 
about his book and many another matter ; he also prom- 
ised George to say nothing about this second visit. 
Then the road became more rough, and when it dwin- 
dled away to be a mere lane — becoming presently only 
a foot track — they had to mind their footsteps, and got 
on but slowly. The night was starlit, and warm, con- 

257 



258 Erewhon Revisited 

sidering that they were more than three thousand feet 
above the sea, but it was very dark, so that my father 
was well enough pleased when George showed him the 
white stones that marked the boundary, and said they 
had better soon make themselves as comfortable as 
they could till morning. 

"We can stay here," he said, "till half-past three, 
there will be a little daylight then; we will rest half an 
hour for breakfast at about five, and by noon we shall 
be at the statues, where we will dine." 

This being settled, George rolled himself up in his 
rug, and in a few minutes went comfortably off to 
sleep. Not so my poor father. He wound up his 
watch, wrapped his rug round him, and lay down; 
but he could get no sleep. After such a day, and such 
an evening, how could any one have slept? 

About three the first signs of dawn began to show, 
and half an hour later my father could see the sleeping 
face of his son — whom it went to his heart to wake. 
Nevertheless he woke him, and in a few minutes the 
two were on their way — George as fresh as a lark — 
my poor father intent on nothing so much as on 
hiding from George how ill and unsound in body and 
mind he was feeling. 

They walked on, saying but little, till at five by my 
father's watch George proposed a halt for breakfast. 
The spot he chose was a grassy oasis among the trees, 
carpeted with subalpine flowers, now in their fullest 
beauty, and close to a small stream that here came 
down from a side valley. The freshness of the morn- 
ing air, the extreme beauty of the place, the lovely 
birds that flitted from tree to tree, the exquisite 
shapes and colours of the flowers, still dew-be- 



Back to the Statues 259 

spangled, and above all, the tenderness with which 
George treated him, soothed my father, and when he 
and George had lit a fire and made some hot corn- 
coffee — with a view to which Yram had put up a bottle 
of milk — ^he felt so much restored as to look forward 
to the rest of his journey without alarm. Moreover 
he had nothing to carry, for George had left his own 
rug at the place where they had slept, knowing that he 
should find it on his return ; he had therefore insisted 
on carrying my father's. My father fought as long 
as he could, but he had to give in. 

"Now tell me," said George, glad to change the 
subject, "what will those three men do about what you 
said to them last night? Will they pay any attention 
to it?" 

My father laughed. "My dear George, what a 
question — I do not know them well enough." 

"Oh yes, you do. At any rate say what you think 
most likely." 

"Very well. I think Dr. Downie will do much as I 
said. He will not throw the whole thing over, through 
fear of schism, loyalty to a party from which he can- 
not well detach himself, and because he does not think 
that the public is quite tired enough of its toy. He will 
neither preach nor write against it, but he will live 
lukewarmly against it, and this is what the Hankys 
hate. They can stand either hot or cold, but they are 
afraid of lukewarm. In England Dr. Downie would 
be a Broad Churchman." 

"Do you think we shall ever get rid of Sunchildism 
altogether?" 

"If they stick to the cock-and-bull stories they are 
telling now, and rub them in, as Hanky did on Sun- 



26o Erewhon Revisited 

day, it may go, and go soon. It has taken root too 
quickly and easily; and its top is too heavy for its 
roots ; still there are so many chances in its favour that 
it may last a long time." 

"And how about Hanky?" 

"He will brazen it out, relic, chariot, and all: and 
he will welcome more relics and more cock-and-bull 
stories ; his single eye will be upon his own aggrandise- 
ment and that of his order. Plausible, unscrupulous, 
heartless scoundrel that he is, he will play for the 
queen and the women of the court, as Dr. Downie will 
play for the king and the men. He and his party will 
sleep neither night nor day, but they will have one 
redeeming feature — whoever they may deceive, they 
will not deceive themselves. They believe every one 
else to be as bad as they are, and see no reason why 
they should not push their own wares in the way of 
business. Hanky is everything that we in England 
rightly or wrongly believe a typical Jesuit to be." 

"And Panky — what about him?" 

"Panky must persuade himself of his own lies, be- 
fore he is quite comfortable about telling them to other 
people. Hanky keeps Hanky well out of it; Panky 
must have a base of operations in Panky. Hanky will 
lead him by the nose, bit by bit, for his is the master 
spirit. In England Panky would be what we call an 
extreme ritualist." 

"Then the real battle will be between Hanky and 
Dr. Downie. Which will carry the day?" 

"For the present, probably Hanky. He is the more 
vigilant and energetic; in this case Sunchildism will 
have to go, and I am afraid your whole Musical Bank 
system will be swept away along with it." 



Back to the Statues 261 

"And why not?" 

''Because, my dear boy, though false in the letter, if 
good counsels prevail, it may be made true enough in 
spirit. If it were to go, its place would be soon filled 
by men who would be as false in letter as the others 
were, and much more false in spirit. You want a 
heart to check your head, and a head to check your 
heart. As in our English body politic there are two 
parties opposed to one another, neither of which can 
thrive if the other is unduly weakened, so in our spir- 
itual and intellectual world two parties more or less 
antagonistic are equally necessary. Those who are at 
the head of science provide us with the one party; 
those whom we call our churchmen are the other. Both 
are corrupt, but we can spare neither, for each checks 
as far as it can the corruptions of the other." 

"Then you would have us uphold Sunchildism, 
knowing it to be untrue?" 

''Do what you will, you will not get perfect truth. 
And if you can follow the lead which I believe Dr. 
Downie will give you, that is to say, get rid of cock- 
and-bull stories, idealise my unworthy self, and, as I 
said last night, make me a peg on which to hang your 
own best thoughts — Sunchildism will be as near truth 
as anything you are likely to get. But if Hankyism 
triumphs, come what may you must get rid of it, for 
he and his school will tamper with the one sure and 
everlasting word of God revealed to us by human ex- 
perience. He who plays fast and loose with this is 
as one who would forge God's signature to a cheque 
drawn on God's own bank." 

"Are we to foster the belief that it was indeed 
the Sunchild who interrupted Hanky's sermon?" 



262 Erewhon Revisited 

"Yes, where you safely can, but not otherwise; and 
commit the facts to writing as soon as you can find 
time. Do nothing to jeopardise your own safety; 
you can do more by perfunctory acquiescence than by 
open dissent. And tell those friends whom you can 
trusty what these my parting words to you have been. 
But above all I charge you solemnly, do nothing to 
jeopardise your own safety; you cannot play into 
Hanky's hands more certainly than by risking this. 
Think how he and Panky would rejoice, and how Dr. 
Downie would grieve. Be wise and wary; bide your 
time; do what you prudently can, and you will find 
you can do much; try to do more, and you will do 
nothing. Be guided by the Mayor, by your mother — 
and by that dear old lady whose grandson you 
will " 

'Then they have told you," interrupted the youth, 
blushing scarlet. 

''My dearest boy, of course they have, and I have 
seen her, and am head over ears in love with her 
myself." 

He was all smiles and blushes, and vowed for a few 
minutes that it was a shame of them to tell me, but 
presently he said — 

"Then you like her?" 

"Rather!" said my father vehemently, and shaking 
George by the hand. But he said nothing about the 
nuggets and the sovereigns, knowing that Yram did 
not wish him to do so. Neither did George say any- 
thing about his determination to start for the capital 
in the morning, and make a clean breast of everything 
to the King. So soon does it become necessary even 
for those who are most cordially attached to hide 



Back to the Statues 263 

things from one another. My father, however, was 
made comfortable by receiving a promise from the 
youth that he would take no step of which the persons 
he had named would disapprove. 

When once Mrs. Humdrum's grand-daughter had 
been introduced there was no more talking about 
Hanky and Panky; for George began to bubble over 
with the subject that was nearest his heart, and how 
much he feared that it would be some time yet before 
he could be married. Many a story did he tell of his 
early attachment and of its course for the last ten 
years, but my space will not allow me to inflict one of 
them on the reader. My father saw that the more he 
listened and sympathised and encouraged, the fonder 
George became of him, and this was all he cared about. 

Thus did they converse hour after hour. They 
passed the Blue Pool, without seeing it or even talking 
about it for more than a minute. George kept an eye 
on the quails and declared them fairly plentiful and 
strong on the wing, but nothing now could keep him 
from pouring out his whole heart about Mrs. Hum- 
drum's grand-daughter, until towards noon they 
•caught sight of the statues, and a halt was made which 
gave my father the first pang he had felt that 
morning, for he knew that the statues would be the 
beginning of the end. 

There was no need to light a fire, for Yram had 
packed for them two bottles of a delicious white wine, 
something Hke White Capri, which went admirably 
with the many more solid good things that she had pro- 
vided for them. As soon as they had finished a hearty 
meal my father said to George, "You must have my 
watch for a keepsake; I see you are not wearing my 



264 Erewhon Revisited 

boots. I fear you did not find them comfortable, but 
I am glad you have not got them on, for I have set 
my heart on keeping yours." 

"Let us settle about the boots first. I rather fancied 
that that was why you put me off when I wanted to 
get my own back again; and then I thought I should 
like yours for a keepsake, so I put on another pair last 
night, and they are nothing like so comfortable as 
yours were." 

"Now I wonder," said my father to me, "whether 
this was true, or whether it was only that dear fellow's 
pretty invention; but true or false I was as delighted 
as he meant me to be." 

I asked George about this when I saw him, and he 
confessed with an ingenuous blush that my father's 
boots had hurt him, and that he had never thought of 
making a keepsake of them, till my father's words 
stimulated his invention. 

As for the watch, which was only a silver one, but 
of the best make, George protested for a time, but 
when he had yielded, my father could see that he was 
overjoyed at getting it; for watches, though now per- 
mitted, were expensive and not in com^mon use. 

Having thus bribed him, my father broached the 
possibility of his meeting him at the statues on that 
day twelvemonth, but of course saying nothing about 
why he was so anxious that he should come. 

"I will come," said my father, "not a yard farther 
than the statues, and if I cannot come I will send your 
brother. And I will come at noon; but it is possible 
that the river down below may be in fresh, and I may 
not be able to hit off the day, though I will move 
heaven and earth to do so. Therefore if I do not meet 



Back to the Statues 265 

you on the day appointed, do your best to come also 
at noon on the following day. I know how incon- 
venient this will be for you, and will come true to the 
day if it is possible." 

To my father's surprise, George did not raise so 
many difficulties as he had expected. He said it might 
be done, if neither he nor my father were to go beyond 
the statues. ''And difficult as it will be for you," said 
George, "you had better come a second day if neces- 
sary, as I will, for who can tell what might happen to 
make the first day impossible?" 

"Then," said my father, "we shall be spared that 
horrible feeling that we are parting without hope of 
seeing each other again. I find it hard enough to say 
good-bye even now, but I do not know how I could 
have faced it if you had not agreed to our meeting 
again." 

"The day fixed upon will be our XXL i. 3, and the 
hour noon as near as may be ?" 

"So. Let me write it down : 'XXL i. 3, i.e. our De- 
cember 9, 1 89 1, I am to meet George at the statues, at 
twelve o'clock, and if he does not come, I am to be 
there again on the following day.' " 

In like manner, George wrote down what he was 
to do : "XXL i. 3, or failing this XXL i. 4. Statues. 
Noon." 

"This," he said, "is a solemn covenant, is it not?" 

"Yes," said my father, "and may all good omens 
attend it!" 

The words were not out of his mouth before a 
mountain bird, something like our jackdaw, but smaller 
and of a bluer black, flew out of the hollow mouth of 
one of the statues, and with a hearty chuckle perched 



266 Erewhon Revisited 

on the ground at his feet, attracted doubtless by the 
scraps of food that were lying about. With the fear- 
lessness of birds in that country, it looked up at him 
and George, gave another hearty chuckle, and flew 
back to its statue with the largest fragment it could 
find. 

They settled that this was an omen so propitious 
that they could part in good hope. "Let us finish the 
wine," said my father, "and then, do what must be 
done." 

They finished the wine to each other's good health; 
George drank also to mine, and said he hoped my 
father would bring me with him, while my father 
drank to Yram, the Mayor, their children, Mrs. Hum- 
drum, and above all to Mrs. Humdrum's grand- 
daughter. They then re-packed all that could be taken 
away; my father rolled his rug to his liking, slung it 
over his shoulder, gripped George's hand, and said, 
"My dearest boy, when we have each turned our backs 
upon one another, let us walk our several ways as fast 
as we can, and try not to look behind us." 

So saying he loosed his grip of George's hand, 
bared his head, lowered it, and turned away. 

George burst into tears, and followed him after he 
had gone two paces; he threw his arms round him, 
hugged him, kissed him on his lips, cheeks, and 
forehead, and then turning round, strode full speed 
towards Sunch'ston. My father never took his eyes 
off him till he was out of sight, but the boy did not 
look round. When he could see him no more, my 
father with faltering gait, and feeling as though a 
prop had suddenly been taken from under him, began 
to follow the stream down towards his old camp. 



CHAPTER XXVI 

MY FATHER REACHES HOME, AND DIES NOT LONG 
AFTERWARDS 

My father could walk but slowly, for George's boots 
had blistered his feet, and it seemed to him that the 
river-bed, of which he caught glimpses now and again, 
never got any nearer; but all things come to an end, 
and by seven o'clock on the night of Tuesday, he was 
on the spot which he had left on the preceding Friday 
morning. Three entire days had intervened, but he 
felt that something, he knew not what, had seized him, 
and that whereas before these three days life had been 
one thing, what little might follow them, would be 
another — ^and a very different one. 

He soon caught sight of his horse which had 
strayed a mile lower down the river-bed, and in spite 
of his hobbles had crossed one ugly stream that my 
father dared not ford on foot. Tired though he was, 
he went after him, bridle in hand, and when the 
friendly creature saw him, it recrossed the stream, and 
came to him of its own accord — either tired of his own 
company, or tempted by some bread my father held 
out towards him. My father took off the hobbles, and 
rode him bare-backed to the camping ground, where 
he rewarded him with more bread and biscuit, and 
then hobbled him again for the night. 

"It was here," he said to me on one of the first days 

267 



268 Erewhon Revisited 

after his return, ''that I first knew myself to be a 
broken man. As for meeting George again, I felt 
sure that it would be all I could do to meet his brother; 
and though George was always in my thoughts, it was 
for you and not him that I was now yearning. When 
I gave George my watch, how glad I was that I had 
left my gold one at home, for that is yours, and I 
could not have brought myself to give it him.'* 

"Never mind that, my dear father," said I, ''but tell 
me how you got down the river, and thence home 
again.'' 

*'My very dear boy," he said, "I can hardly re- 
member, and I had no energy to make any more notes. 
I remember putting a scrap of paper into the box of 
sovereigns, merely sending George my love along with 
the money; I remember also dropping the box into a 
hole in a tree, which I blazed, and towards which I 
drew a line of wood-ashes. I seem to see a poor un- 
hinged creature gazing moodily for hours into a fire 
which he heaps up now and again with wood. There 
is not a breath of air; Nature sleeps so calmly that 
she dares not even breathe for fear of waking; the 
very river has hushed his flow. Without, the starlit 
calm of a summer's night in a great wilderness; 
within, a hurricane of wild and incoherent thoughts 
battling with one another in their fury to fall upon 
him and rend him — and on the other side the great wall 
of mountain, thousands of children praying at their 
mother's knee to this poor dazed thing. I suppose this 
half delirious wretch must have been myself. But I 
must have been more ill when I left England than I 
thought I was, or Erewhon would not have broken me 
down as it did.'* 



The Homeward Journey 269 

No doubt he was right. Indeed it was because Mr. 
Cathie and his doctor saw that he was out of health 
and in urgent need of change, that they left off op- 
posing his wish to travel. There is no use, however, 
in talking about this now. 

I never got from him how he managed to reach the 
shepherd's hut, but I learned some little from the 
shepherd, when I stayed with him both on going to- 
wards Erewhon and on returning. 

"He did not seem to have drink in him," said the 
shepherd, *Svhen he first came here ; but he must have 
been pretty full of it, or he must have had some bottles 
in his saddle-bags; for he was awful when he came 
back. He had got them worse than any man I ever 
saw, only that he was not awkward. He said there 
was a bird flying out of a giant's mouth and laughing 
at him, and he kept muttering about a blue pool, and 
hanky-panky of all sorts, and he said he knew it was 
all hanky-panky, at least I thought he said so, but it 
was no use trying to follow him, for it was all nothing 
but horrors. He said I was to stop the people from 
trying to worship him. Then he said the sky opened 
and he could see the angels going about and singing 
^Hallelujah.' " 

"How long did he stay with you?" I asked. 

"About ten days, but the last three he was himself 
again, only too weak to move. He thought he was 
cured except for weakness.'* 

"Do you know how he had been spending the last 
two days or so before he got down to your hut?" 

I said two days, because this was the time I sup- 
posed he would take to descend the river. 

"I should say drinking all the time. He said he had 



270 Erewhon Revisited 

fallen off his horse two or three times, till he took to 
leading him. If he had had any other horse than old 
Doctor he would have been a dead man. Bless you, I 
have known that horse ever since he was foaled, and 
I never saw one like him for sense. He would pick 
fords better than that gentleman could, I know, and 
if the gentleman fell off him he would just stay stock 
still. He was badly bruised, poor man, when he got 
here. I saw him through the gorge when he left me, 
and he gave me a sovereign; he said he had only one 
other left to take him down to the port, or he would 
have made it more." 

"He was my father," said I, "and he is dead, but 
before he died he told me to give you five pounds 
which I have brought you. I think you are wrong in 
saying that he had been drinking." 

*'That is what they all say; but I take it very kind 
of him to have thought of me." 

My father's illness for the first three weeks after 
his return played with him as a cat plays with a 
mouse ; now and again it would let him have a day or 
two's run, during which he was so cheerful and un- 
clouded that his doctor was quite hopeful about him. 
At various times on these occasions I got from him 
that when he left the shepherd's hut, he thought his 
illness had run itself out, and that he should now reach 
the port from which he was to sail for S. Francisco 
without misadventure. This he did, and he was able 
to do all he had to do at the port, though frequently 
attacked with passing fits of giddiness. I need not 
dwell upon his voyage to S. Francisco, and thence 
home ; it is enough to say that he was able to travel by 



The Homeward Journey 271 

himself in spite of gradually, but continually, increas- 
ing failure. 

"When," he said, "I reached the port, I telegraphed, 
as you know, for more money. How puzzled you 
must have been. I sold my horse to the man from 
whom I bought it, at a loss of only about £io, and I 
left with him my saddle, saddle-bags, small hatchet, 
my hobbles, and in fact everything that I had taken 
with me, except what they had impounded in Ere- 
whon. Yram's rug I dropped into the river when I 
knew that I should no longer need it — as also her sub- 
stitutes for my billy and pannikin; and I burned her 
basket. The shepherd would have asked me questions. 
You will find an order to deliver everything up to 
bearer. You need therefore take nothing from Eng- 
land." 

At another time he said, "When you go, for it is 
plain I cannot, and go one or other of us must, try 
and get the horse I had : he will be nine years old, and 
he knows all about the rivers : if you leave everything 
to him, you may shut your eyes, but do not interfere 
with him. Give the shepherd what I said and he will 
attend to you, but go a day or two too soon, for the 
margin of one day was not enough to allow in case of 
a fresh in the river; if the water is discoloured you 
must not cross it — not even with Doctor. I could not 
ask George to come up three days running from 
Sunch'ston to the statues and back." 

Here he became exhausted. Almost the last co- 
herent string of sentences I got from him was as 
follows : — 

"About George's money if I send him £2000 you 
will still have nearly £150,000 left, and Mr. Cathie 



272 Erewhon Revisited 

will not let you try to make it more. I know you 
would give him four or five thousand, but the 
Mayor and I talked it over, and settled that £2000 in 
gold would make him a rich man. Consult our good 
friend Alfred" (meaning, of course, Mr. Cathie) 
"about the best way of taking the money. I am afraid 
there is nothing for it but gold, and this will be a 
great weight for you to carry — ^about, I believe, 36 lbs. 
Can you do this? I really think that if you lead your 
horse you . . . no — ^there will be the getting him down 
again " 

*'Don't worry about it, my dear father," said I, "I 
can do it easily if I stow the load rightly, and I will 
see to this. I shall have nothing else to carry, for I 
shall camp down below both morning and evening. 
But would you not like to send some present to the 
Mayor, Yram, their other children, and Mrs. Hum- 
drum's grand-daughter?" 

"Do what you can," said my father. And these 
were the last instructions he gave me about those 
adventures with which alone this work is concerned. 

The day before he died, he had a little flicker of 
intelligence, but all of a sudden his face became 
clouded as with great anxiety; he seemed to see some 
horrible chasm in front of him which he had to cross, 
or which he feared that I must cross, for he gasped 
out words, which, as near as I could catch them, were, 
"Look out ! John ! Leap ! Leap ! Le . . . " but he could 
not say all that he was trying to say and closed his 
eyes, having, as I then deemed, seen that he was on the 
brink of that gulf which lies between life and death; 
I took it that in reality he died at that moment; for 
there was neither struggle nor hardly movement of 



The Homeward Journey 273 

any kind afterwards— nothing but a pulse which for 
the next several hours grew fainter and fainter so 
gradually, that it was not till some time after it had 
teased to beat that we were certain of its having 
done so. 



CHAPTER XXVII 

I MEET MY BROTHER GEORGE AT THE STATUES, ON THE 
TOP OF THE PASS INTO EREWHON 

This book has already become longer than I in- 
tended, but I will ask the reader to have patience while 
I tell him briefly of my own visit to the threshold of 
that strange country of which I fear that he may be 
already beginning to tire. 

The winding-up of my father's estate was a very 
simple matter, and by the beginning of September 
1 89 1 I should have been free to start; but about that 
time I became engaged, and naturally enough I did not 
want to be longer away than was necessary. I should 
not have gone at all if I could have helped it. I left, 
however, a fortnight later than my father had done. 

Before starting I bought a handsome gold repeater 
for the Mayor, and a brooch for Yram, of pearls and 
diamonds set in gold, for which I paid £200. For 
Yram's three daughters and for Mrs. Humdrum's 
grand-daughter I took four brooches each of which 
cost about £15, 15s., and for the boys I got three ten- 
guinea silver watches. For George I only took a 
strong English knife of the best make, and the two 
thousand pounds' worth of uncoined gold, which for 
convenience' sake I had had made into small bars. I 
also had a knapsack made that would hold these and 
nothing else — each bar being strongly sewn into its 

274 



I Meet George 275 

place, so that none of them could shift. Whenever I 
went on board ship, or went on shore, I put this on 
my back, so that no one handled it except myself — and 
I can assure the reader that I did not find it a light 
weight to handle. I ought to have taken something 
for old Mrs. Humdrum, but I am ashamed to say that 
I forgot her. 

I went as directly as I could to the port of which 
my father had told me, and reached it on November 
27, one day later than he had done in the preceding 
year. 

On the following day, which was a Saturday, I 
went to the livery stables from which my father had 
bought his horse, and found to my great delight that 
Doctor could be at my disposal, for, as it seemed to 
me, the very reasonable price of fifteen shillings a 
day. I shewed the owner of the stables my father's 
order, and all the articles he had left were immediately 
delivered to me. I was still wearing crape round one 
arm, and the horse-dealer, whose name was Baker, 
said he was afraid the other gentleman might be dead. 

''Indeed, he is so," said I, *'and a great grief it is to 
me; he was my father.'* 

. "Dear, dear," answered Mr. Baker, *'that is a very 
serious thing for the poor gentleman. He seemed 
quite unfit to travel alone, and I feared he was not 
long for this world, but he was bent on going." 

I had nothing now to do but to buy a blanket, pan- 
nikin, and billy, with some tea, tobacco, two bottles of 
brandy, some ship's biscuits, and whatever other few 
items were down on the list of requisites which my 
father had dictated to me. Mr. Baker, seeing that I 
was what he called a new chum, shewed me how to 



276 Erewhon Revisited 

pack my horse, but I kept my knapsack full of gold on 
my back, and though I could see that it puzzled him, 
he asked no questions. There was no reason why I 
should not set out at once for the principal town of the 
colony, which was some ten miles inland ; I, therefore, 
arranged at my hotel that the greater part of my lug- 
gage should await my return, and set out to climb the 
high hills that back the port. From the top of these 
I had a magnificent view of the plains that I should 
have to cross, and of the long range of distant moun- 
tains which bounded them north and south as far as 
the eye could reach. On some of the mountains I 
could still see streaks of snow, but my father had ex- 
plained to me that the ranges I should here see were 
not those dividing the English colony from Erewhon. 
I also saw, some nine miles or so out upon the plains, 
the more prominent buildings of a large town which 
seemed to be embosomed in trees, and this I reached 
in about an hour and a half; for I had to descend at 
a foot's pace, and Doctor's many virtues did not com- 
prise a willingness to go beyond an amble. 

At the town above referred to I spent the night, and 
began to strike across the plains on the following 
morning. I might have crossed these in three days at 
twenty-five miles a day, but I had too much time on 
my hands, and my load of gold was so uncomfortable 
that I was glad to stay at one accommodation house 
after another, averaging about eighteen miles a day. 
I have no doubt that if I had taken advice, I could 
have stowed my load more conveniently, but I could 
not unpack it, and made the best of it as it was. 

On the evening of Wednesday, December 2, I 
reached the river which I should have to follow up ; it 



I Meet George 277 

was here nearing the gorge through which it had to 
pass before the country opened out again at the back 
of the front range. I came upon it quite suddenly on 
reaching the brink of a great terrace, the bank of 
which sloped almost precipitously down towards it, 
but was covered with grass. The terrace was some 
three hundred feet above the river, and faced another 
similar one, w^hich was from a mile and a half to two 
miles distant. At the bottom of this nuge yawning 
chasm rolled the mighty river, and I shuddered at the 
thought of having to cross and recross it. For it was 
angry, muddy, evidently in heavy fresh, and filled 
bank and bank for nearly a mile with a flood of seeth- 
ing waters. 

I follow^ed along the northern edge of the terrace, 
till I reached the last accommodation house that could 
be said to be on the plains — which, by the way, were 
here some eight or nine hundred feet above sea level. 
When I reached this house, I was glad to learn that 
the river was not likely to remain high for more than 
a day or two, and that if what was called a Southerly 
Burster came up, as it might be expected to do at any 
moment, it would be quite low again before three days 
were over. 

At this house I stayed the night, and in the course 
of the evening a stray dog — a retriever, hardly full 
grown, and evidently very much down on his luck — • 
took up with me; when I inquired about him, and 
asked if I might take him with me, the landlord said 
he wished I would, for he knew nothing about him 
and was trying to drive him from the house. Know- 
ing what a boon the companionship of this poor beast 
would be to me when I was camping out alone, I 



278 Erewhon Revisited 

encouraged him, and next morning he followed me as 
a matter of course. 

In the night the Southerly Burster which my host 
anticipated had come up, cold and blustering, but in- 
vigorating after the hot, dry wind that had been 
blowing hard during the daytime as I had crossed the 
plains. A mile or two higher up I passed a large 
sheep-station, but did not stay there. One or two men 
looked at me with surprise, and asked me where I was 
going, whereon I said I was in search of rare plants 
and birds for the Museum of the town at which I had 
slept the night after my arrival. This satisfied their 
curiosity, and I ambled on accompanied by the dog. In 
passing I may say that I found Doctor not to excel at 
any pace except an amble, but for a long journey, 
especially for one who is carrying a heavy, awkward 
load, there is no pace so comfortable; and he ambled 
fairly fast. 

I followed the horse track which had been cut 
through the gorge, and in many places I disliked it 
extremely, for the river, still in fresh, was raging 
furiously ; twice, for some few yards, where the gorge 
was wider and the stream less rapid, it covered the 
track, and I had no confidence that it might not have 
washed it away ; on these occasions Doctor pricked his 
ears towards the water, and was evidently thinking 
exactly what his rider was. He decided, however, 
that all would be sound, and took to the water without 
any urging on my part. Seeing his opinion, I remem- 
bered my father's advice, and let him do what he liked, 
but in one place for three or four yards the water came 
nearly up to his belly, and I was in great fear for the 
watches that were in my saddle-bags. As for the dog, 



I Meet George 279 

I feared I had lost him, but after a time he rejoined 
me, though how he contrived to do so I cannot say. 

Nothing could be grander than the sight of this 
great river pent into a narrow compass, and occasion- 
ally becoming more like an immense waterfall than a 
river, but I was in continual fear of coming to more 
places where the water would be over the track, and 
perhaps of finding myself unable to get any farther, I 
therefore failed to enjoy what was really far the most 
impressive sight in its way that I had ever seen. "Give 
me," I said to myself, "the Thames at Richmond," and 
right thankful was I, when at about two o'clock I 
found that I was through the gorge and in a wide 
valley, the greater part of which, however, was still 
covered by the river. It was here that I heard for the 
first time the curious sound of boulders knocking 
against each other underneath the great body of water 
that kept rolling them round and round. 

I now halted, and lit a fire, for there was much dead 
scrub standing that had remained after the ground 
had been burned for the first time some years previ- 
ously. I made myself some tea, and turned Doctor 
out for a couple of hours to feed. I did not hobble 
him, for my father had told me that he would always 
come for bread. When I had dined, and smoked, and 
slept for a couple of hours or so, I reloaded Doctor 
and resumed my journey towards the shepherd's hut, 
which I caught sight of about a mile before I reached 
it. When nearly half a mile ofY it, I dismounted, and 
made a written note of the exact spot at which I did 
so. I then turned for a couple of hundred yards to my 
right, at right angles to the track, where some huge 
rocks were lying — fallen ages since from the moun- 



28o Erewhon Revisited 

tain that flanked this side of the valley. Here I 
deposited my knapsack in a hollow underneath some 
of the rocks, and put a good sized stone in front of it, 
for I meant spending a couple of days with the shep- 
herd to let the river go down. Moreover, as it was 
now only December 3, I had too much time on my 
hands, but I had not dared to cut things finer. 

I reached the hut at about six o'clock, and intro- 
duced myself to the shepherd, who was a nice, kind 
old man, commonly called Harris, but his real name he 
told me was Horace — Horace Taylor. I had the con- 
versation with him of which I have already told the 
reader, adding that my father had been unable to give 
a coherent account of what he had seen, and that I 
had been sent to get the information he had failed to 
furnish. 

The old man said that I must certainly wait a couple 
of days before I went higher up the river. He had 
made himself a nice garden, in which he took the 
greatest pride, and which supplied him with plenty 
of vegetables. He was very glad to have company, 
and to receive the new^spapers which I had taken care 
to bring him. He had a real genius for simple cookery, 
and fed me excellently. My father's £5, and the 
ration of brandy which I nightly gave him, made me 
a welcome guest, and though I was longing to be at 
any rate as far as the foot of the pass into Erewhon, I 
amused myself very w^ell in an abundance of ways 
with which I need not trouble the reader. 

One of the first things that Harris said to me was, 
*T wish I knew what your father did with the nice red 
blanket he had with him when he went up the river. 
He had none when he came down again; I have no 



I Meet George 281 

horse here, but I borrowed one from a man who came 
up one clay from down below, and rode to a place 
where I found what I am sure were the ashes of the 
last fire he made, but I could find neither the blanket 
nor the billy and pannikin he took away with him. He 
said he supposed he must have left the things there, 
but he could remember nothing about it." 

"I am afraid," said I, "that I cannot help you." 

"At any rate," continued the shepherd, "I did not 
have my ride for nothing, for as I was coming back I 
found this rug half covered with sand on the river- 
bed." 

As he spoke he pointed to an excellent warm rug, on 
the spare bunk in his hut. "It is none of our make," 
said he; "I suppose some foreign digger has come 
over from the next river down south and got drowned, 
for it had not been very long where I found it, at least 
I think not, for it was not much fly-blown, and no one 
had passed here to go up. the river since your father." 

I knew what it was, but I held my tongue beyond 
saying that the rug was a very good one. 

The next day, December 4, v^as lovely, after a night 
that had been clear and cold, with frost towards early 
morning. When the shepherd had gone for some 
three hours in the forenoon to see his sheep (that were 
now lambing), I walked down to the place where I 
had left my knapsack, and carried it a good mile above 
the hut, v^here I again hid it. I could see the great range 
from one place, and the thick new fallen snow as- 
sured me that the river would be quite normal shortly. 
Indeed, by evening it was hardly at all discoloured, but 
I waited another day, and set out on the morning of 
Sunday, December 6. The river was now almost as 



282 Erewhon Revisited 

low as in winter, and Harris assured me that if I used 
my eyes I could not miss finding a ford over one 
stream or another every half mile or so. I had the 
greatest difficulty in preventing him from accompany- 
ing me on foot for some little distance, but I got rid 
of him in the end ; he came with me beyond the place 
where I had hidden my knapsack, but when he had 
left me long enough, I rode back and got it. 

I see I am dwelling too long upon my own small 
adventures. Suffice it that, accompanied by my dog, I 
followed the north bank of the river till I found I 
must cross one stream before I could get any farther. 
This place would not do, and I had to ride half a mile 
back before I found one that seemed as if it might be 
safe. I fancy my father must have done just the 
same thing, for Doctor seemed to know the ground, 
and took to the water the moment I brought him to it. 
It never reached his belly, but I confess I did not like 
it. By and by I had to recross, and so on, off and on, 
till at noon I camped for dinner. Here the dog found 
me a nest of young ducks, nearly fledged, from which 
the parent birds tried with great success to decoy me. 
I fully thought I was going to catch them, but the dog 
knew better and made straight for the nest, from 
which he returned immediately with a fine young duck 
in his mouth, which he laid at my feet, wagging his 
tail and barking. I took another from the nest and 
left two for the old birds. 

The afternoon was much as the morning and 
towards seven I reached a place which suggested itself 
as a good camping ground. I had hardly fixed on it 
and halted before I saw a few pieces of charred wood, 
and felt sure that my father must have camped at this 



I Meet George 283 

very place before me. I hobbled Doctor, unloaded, 
plucked and singed a duck, and gave the dog some of 
the meat with which Harris had furnished me ; I made 
tea, laid my duck on the embers till it was cooked, 
smoked, gave myself a nightcap of brandy and water, 
and by and by rolled myself round in my blanket, with 
the dog curled up beside me. I will not dwell upon 
the strangeness of my feelings — nor the extreme 
beauty of the night. But for the dog, and Doctor, I 
should have been frightened, but I knew that there 
were no savage creatures or venomous snakes in the 
country, and both the dog and Doctor were such good 
companionable creatures, that I did not feel so much 
oppressed by the solitude as I had feared I should be. 
But the night was cold, and my blanket was not 
enough to keep me comfortably warm. 

The following day was delightfully warm as soon 
as the sun got to the bottom of the valley, and the 
fresh fallen snow disappeared so fast from the snowy 
range that I was afraid it would raise the river — 
which, indeed, rose in the afternoon and became 
slightly discoloured, but it cannot have been more than 
three or four inches deeper, for it never reached the 
bottom of my saddle-bags. I believe Doctor knew 
exactly where I was going, for he wanted no guidance. 
I halted again at mid-day, got two more ducks, crossed 
and recrossed the river,, or some of its streams, several 
times, and at about six, caught sight, after a bend in 
the valley, of the glacier descending on to the river bed. 
This I knew to be close to the point at which I was to 
camp for the night, and from which I was to ascend 
the mountain. After another hour's slow progress 
over the increasing roughness of the river-bed, I saw 



284 Erewhon Revisited 

the triangular delta of which my father had told me, 
and the stream that had formed it, bounding down the 
mountain side. Doctor went right up to the place 
where my father's fire had been, and I again found 
many pieces of charred wood and ashes. 

As soon as I had unloaded Doctor and hobbled him, 
I went to a tree hard by, on which I could see the 
mark of a blaze, and towards which I thought I could 
see a line of wood ashes running. There I found a 
hole in which some bird had evidently been wont to 
build, and surmised correctly that it must be the one 
in which my father had hidden his box of sovereigns. 
There was no box in the hole now, and I began to feel 
that I was at last within measureable distance of Ere- 
whon and the Erewhonians. 

I camped for the night here, and again found my 
single blanket insufficient. The next day, i.e. Tues- 
day, December 8, I had to pass as I best could, and it 
occurred to me that as I should find the gold a great 
weight, I had better take it some three hours up the 
mountain side and leave it there, so as to make the 
following day less fatiguing, and this I did, returning 
to my camp for dinner; but I was panic-stricken all 
the rest of the day lest I should not have hidden it 
safely, or lest I should be unable to find it next day — 
conjuring up a hundred absurd fancies as to what 
might befall it. And after all, heavy though it was, I 
could have carried it all the way. In the afternoon I 
saddled Doctor and rode him up to the glaciers, which 
were indeed magnificent, and then I made the few 
notes of my journey from which this chapter has been 
taken. I made excuses for turning in early, and at 
daybreak rekindled my fire and got my breakfast. All 



I Meet George 285 

the time the companionship of the dog was an un- 
speakable comfort to me. 

It was now the day my father had fixed for my 
meeting with George, and my excitement (with which 
I have not yet troubled the reader, though it had been 
consuming me ever since I had left Harris's hut) was 
beyond all bounds, so much so that I almost feared I 
was in a fever which would prevent my completing the 
little that remained of my task ; in fact, I was in as 
great a panic as I had been about the gold that I had 
left. My hands trembled as I took the watches and 
the brooches for Yram and her daughters from my 
saddle-bags, which I then hung, probably on the very 
bough on which my father had hung them. Needless 
to say, I also hung my saddle and bridle along with 
the saddle-bags. 

It was nearly seven before I started, and about ten 
before I reached the hiding-place of my knapsack. I 
found it, of course, quite easily, shouldered it, and 
toiled on towards the statues. At a quarter before 
twelve I reached them, and almost beside myself as I 
was, could not refrain from some disappointment at 
finding them a good deal smaller than I expected. My 
father, correcting the measurement he had given in 
his book, said he thought that they were about four 
or five times the size of life; but really I do not think 
they were more than twenty feet high, any one of 
them. In other respects my father's description of 
them is quite accurate. There was no wind, and as a 
matter of course, therefore, they were not chanting. I 
wiled away the quarter of an hour before the time 
when George became due, with wondering at them, 
and in a way admiring them, hideous though they 



286 Erewhon Revisited 

were ; but all the time I kept looking towards the part 
from which George should come. 

At last my watch pointed to noon, but there was no 
George. A quarter past twelve, but no George. Half- 
past, still no George. One o'clock, and all the quarters 
till three o'clock, but still no George. I tried to eat 
some of the ship's biscuits I had brought with me, but 
I could not. My disappointment was now as great as 
my excitement had been all the forenoon; at three 
o'clock I fairly cried, and for half an hour could only 
fling myself on the ground and give way to all the 
unreasonable spleen that extreme vexation could sug- 
gest. True, I kept telling myself that for aught I 
knew George might be dead, or down with a fever; 
but this would not do ; for in this last case he should 
have sent one of his brothers to meet me, and it was 
not likely that he was dead. I am afraid I thought it 
most probable that he had been casual — of which 
unworthy suspicion I have long since been heartily 
ashamed. 

I put the brooches inside my knapsack, and hid it 
in a place where I was sure no one would find it ; then, 
with a heavy heart, I trudged down again to my camp 
— broken in spirit, and hopeless for the morrow. 

I camped again, but it was some hours before I got 
a wink of sleep; and when sleep came it was accom- 
panied by a strange dream. I dreamed that I was by 
my father's bedside, watching his last flicker of in- 
telligence, and vainly trying to catch the words that 
he was not less vainly trying to utter. All of a sudden 
the bed seemed to be at my camping ground, and the 
largest of the statues appeared, quite small, high up 
the mountain side, but striding down like a giant in 



I Meet George 287 

seven league boots till it stood over me and my father, 
and shouted out ''Leap, John, leap." In the horror of 
this vision I woke with a loud cry that woke my dog 
also and made him shew such evident signs of fear, 
that it seemed to me as though he too must have 
shared my dream. 

Shivering with cold I started up in a frenzy, but 
there was nothing, save a night of such singular beauty 
that I did not even try to go to sleep again. Naturally 
enough, on trying to keep awake I dropped asleep be- 
fore many minutes were over. 

In the morning I again climbed up to the statues, 
without, to my surprise, being depressed with the idea 
that George would again fail to meet me. On the con- 
trary, without rhyme or reason, I had a strong pre- 
sentiment that he would come. And sure enough, as 
soon as I caught sight of the statues, which I did about 
a quarter to twelve, I saw a youth coming towards me, 
with a quick step, and a beaming face that had only to 
be seen to be fallen in love with. 

"You are my brother," said he to me. ''Is my father 
with you?" 

I pointed to the crape on my arm, and to the ground, 
but said nothing. 

He understood me, and bared his head. Then he 
flung his arms about me and kissed my forehead ac- 
cording to Erewhonian custom. I was a little sur- 
prised at his saying nothing to me about the way in 
which he had disappointed me on the preceding day; I 
resolved, however, to wait for the explanation that I 
felt sure he would give me presently. 



CHAPTER XXVIII 

GEORGE AND I SPEND A FEW HOURS TOGETHER AT 

THE STATUES, AND THEN PART 1 REACH HOME 

POSTSCRIPT 

I HAVE said on an earlier page that George gained 
an immediate ascendancy over me, but ascendancy is 
not the word — he took me by storm; how, or why, I 
neither know nor want to know, but before I had been 
with him more than a few minutes I felt as though I 
had known and loved him all my life. And the dog 
fawned upon him as though he felt just as I did. 

''Come to the statues," said he, as soon as he had 
somewhat recovered from the shock of the news I had 
given him. "V/e can sit down there on the very stone 
on which our father and I sat a year ago. I have 
brought a basket, which my mother packed for — for — 
him and me. Did he talk to you about me?" 

"He talked of nothing so much, and he thought of 
nothing so much. He had » your boots put where he 
could see them from his bed until he died." 

Then followed the explanation a^out these boots, of 
which the reader has already been told. This made us 
both laugh, and from that moment we were cheerful. 

I say nothing about our enjoyment of the luncheon 
with which Yram had provided us, and if I were to 
detail all that I told George about my father, and 
all the additional information that I got from 

288 



Conclusion 289 

him — (many a point did he clear up for me that I had 
not fully understood) — I should fill several chapters, 
whereas I have left myself only one. Luncheon being 
over I said — 

"And are you married?" 

"Yes" (with a blush), "and are you?" 

I could not blush. Why should I ? And yet young 
people — especially the most ingenious among them — - 
are apt to flush up on being asked if they are, or are 
going, to be married. If I could have blushed, I 
would. As it was I could only say that I was engaged 
and should marry as soon as I got back. 

"Then you have come all this way for me, when you 
were wanting to get married?" 

"Of course I have. My father on his death-bed told 
me to do so, and to bring you something that I have 
brought you." 

"What trouble I have given! How can I thank 
you?" 

"Shake hands with me." 

Whereon he gave my hand a stronger grip than I 
had quite bargained for. 

"And now," said I, "before I tell you what I have 
brought, you must promise me to accept it. Your 
father said I was not to leave you till you had done so, 
and I was to say that he sent it with his dying bless- 
ing." 

After due demur George gave his promise, and I 
took him to the place where I had hidden my knapsack. 

"I brought it up yesterday," said I. 

"Yesterday? but why?" 

"Because yesterday — was it not? — was the first of 



290 Erewhon Revisited 

the two days agreed upon between you and our 
father?" 

*'No — surely to-day is the first day — I was to come 
XXL i. 3, which would be your December 9.'' 

''But yesterday was December 9 with us — to-day is 
December 10." 

"Strange ! What day of the week do you make it ?'* 

"To-day is Thursday, December 10." 

"This is still stranger — we make it Wednesday ; yes- 
terday was Tuesday." 

Then I saw it. The year XX. had been a leap year 
with the Erewhonians, and 1891 in England had not. 
This, then, was what had crossed my father's brain in 
his dying hours, and what he had vainly tried to tell 
me. It was also what my unconscious self had been 
struggling to tell my conscious one during the past 
night, but which my conscious self had been too stupid 
to understand. And yet my conscious self had caught 
it in an imperfect sort of a way after all, for from the 
moment that my dream had left me I had been com- 
posed, and easy in my mind that all would be well. I 
wish some one would write a book about dreams and 
parthenogenesis — for that the two are part and parcel 
of the same story — a brood of folly without father 
bred — I cannot doubt. 

I did not trouble George with any of this rubbish, 
but only shewed him how the mistake had arisen. 
When we had laughed sufficiently over my mistake — 
for it was I who had come up on the wrong day, not 
he — I fished my knapsack out of its hiding-place. 

"Do not unpack it," said I, "beyond taking out the 
brooches, or you will not be able to pack it so well ; but 
you can see the ends of the bars of gold, and you can 



Conclusion 291 

feel the weight; my father sent them for you. The 
pearl brooch is for your mother, the smaller brooches 
are for your sisters, and your wife." 

I then told him how much gold there was, and from 
my pockets brought out the watches and the English 
knife. 

"This last," I said, "is the only thing that I am 
giving you; the rest is all from our father. I have 
many many times as much gold myself, and this is 
legally your property as much as mine is mine." 

George was aghast, but he was powerless alike to 
express his feelings, or to refuse the gold. 

"Do you mean to say that my father left me this by 
his will?" 

"Certainly he did," said I, inventing a pious fraud. 

"It is all against my oath," said he, looking grave. 

"Your oath be hanged," said I. "You must give the 
gold to the Mayor, who knows that it was coming, and 
it will appear to the world as though he were giving it 
you now instead of leaving you anything." 

"But it is ever so much too much !" 

"It is not half enough. You and the Mayor must 
settle all that between you. He and our father talked 
it all over, and this was what they settled." 

"And our father planned all this without saying a 
word to me about it while we were on our way up 
here?" 

"Yes. There might have been some hitch in the 
gold's coming. Besides the Mayor told him not to tell 
you." 

"And he never said anything about the other money 
he left for me — which enabled me to marry at once? 
Why was this?" 



292 Erewhon Revisited 

"Your mother said he was not to do so." 

"Bless my heart, how they have duped me all round. 
But why would not my mother let your father tell me ? 
Oh yes — she was afraid I should tell the King about it, 
as I certainly should, when I told him all the rest." 

"Tell the King?" said I, "what have you been tell- 
ing the King?" 

"Everything ; except about the nuggets and the sov- 
ereigns, of which I knew nothing; and I have felt my- 
self a blackguard ever since for not telling him about 
these when he came up here last autumn — but I let the 
Mayor and my mother talk me over, as I am afraid 
they will do again." 

"When did you tell the King?" 

Then followed all the details that I have told in the 
latter part of Chapter XXI. When I asked how the 
.King took the confession, George said — 

"He was so much flattered at being treated like a 
reasonable being, and Dr. Downie, who was chief 
spokesman, played his part so discreetly, without at- 
tempting to obscure even the most compromising 
issues, that though his Majesty made some show of 
displeasure at first, it was plain that he was heartily 
enjoying the whole story. 

"Dr. Downie shewed very well. He took on him- 
self the onus of having advised our action, and he gave 
me all the credit of having proposed that we should 
make a clean breast of everything. 

"The King, too, behaved with truly royal polite- 
ness; he was on the point of asking why I had not 
taken our father to the Blue Pool at once, and flung 
him into it on the Sunday afternoon, when something 
seemed to strike him : he gave me a searching look, on 



Conclusion 293 

which he said in an undertone, *Oh yes,' and did not 
go on with his question. He never blamed me for 
anything, and when I begged him to accept my resigna- 
tion of the Rangership, he said — 

" 'No. Stay where you are till I lose confidence in 
you, which will not, I think, be very soon. I will come 
and have a few days' shooting about the middle of 
March, and if I have good sport I shall order your 
salary to be increased. If any more foreign devils 
come over, do not Blue- Pool them ; send them down to 
me, and I will see what I think of them ; I am much 
disposed to encourage a few of them to settle here.' 

''I am sure," continued George, *'that he said this 
because he knew I was half a foreign devil myself. In- 
deed he won my heart not only by the delicacy of his 
consideration, but by the obvious good will he bore me. 
I do not know what he did with the nuggets, but he 
gave orders that the blanket and the rest of my father's 
kit should be put in the great Erewhonian Museum. 
As regards my father's receipt, and the Professors' 
two depositions, he said he would have them carefully 
preserved in his secret archives. 'A document,' he said 
somewhat enigmatically, 'is a document — but, Pro- 
'fessor Hanky, you can have this' — and as he spoke he 
handed him back his pocket-handkerchief. 

"Hanky during the whole interview was furious, at 
having to play so undignified a part, but even more 
so, because the King while he paid marked attention 
to Dr. Downie, and even to myself, treated him with 
amused disdain. Nevertheless, angry though he was, 
he was impenitent, unabashed, and brazened it out at 
Bridgeford, that the King had received him with open 
arms, and had snubbed Dr. Downie and myself. But 



294 Erewhon Revisited 

for his (Hanky's) intercession, I should have been dis- 
missed then and there from the Rangership. And so 
forth. Panky never opened his mouth. 

"Returning to the King, his Majesty said to Dr. 
Downie, *I am afraid I shall not be able to canonize 
any of you gentlemen just yet. We must let this affair 
blow over. Indeed I am in half a mind to have this 
Sunchild bubble pricked; I never liked it, and am 
getting tired of it; you Musical Bank gentlemen are 
overdoing it. I will talk it over with her Majesty. As 
for Professor Hanky, I do not see how I can keep one 
who has been so successfully hoodwinked, as my Pro- 
fessor of Worldly Wisdom; but I will consult her 
Majesty about this point also. Perhaps I can find an- 
other post for him. If I decide on having Sunchildism 
pricked, he shall apply the pin. You may go.' 

"And glad enough," said George, "we all of us 
were to do so." 

"But did he," I asked, "try to prick the bubble of 
Sunchildism?" 

"Oh no. As soon as he said he would talk it over 
with her Majesty, I knew the whole thing would end 
in smoke, as indeed to all outward appearance it 
shortly did; for Dr. Downie advised him not to be in 
too great a hurry, and whatever he did to do it grad- 
ually. He therefore took no further action than to 
show marked favour to practical engineers and mech- 
anicians. Moreover he started an aeronautical society, 
which made Bridgeford furious; but so far, I am 
afraid it has done us no good, for the first ascent was 
disastrous, involving the death of the poor fellow who 
made it, and since then no one has ventured to ascend. 
I am afraid we do not get on very fast." 



Conclusion 295 

"Did the King," I asked, ''increase your salary?" 

"Yes. He doubled it." 

"And what do they say in Sunch'ston about our 
fathers second visit?" 

George laughed, and shewed me the newspaper ex- 
tract which I have already given. I asked who wrote 
it. 

"I did," said he, with a demure smile; "I wrote it 
at night after I returned home, and before starting 
for the capital next morning. I called myself 'the de- 
servedly popular Ranger,' to avert suspicion. No one 
found me out ; you can keep the extract ; I brought it 
here on purpose." 

"It does you great credit. Was there ever any 
lunatic, and was he found?" 

"Oh yes. That part was true, except that he had 
never been up our way." 

"Then the poacher is still at large?" 

"It is to be feared so." 

"And were Dr. Downie and the Professors canon- 
ized after all?" 

"Not yet ; but the Professors will be next month — 
for Hanky is still Professor. Dr. Downie backed out 
of it. He said it was enough to be a Sunchildist with- 
out being a Sunchild Saint. He worships the jumping 
cat as much as the others, but he keeps his eye better 
on the cat, and sees sooner both w^hen it will jump, and 
where it will jump to. Then, without disturbing any 
one, he insinuates himself into the place which will be 
best when the jump is over. Some say that the cat 
knows him and follows him; at all events when he 
makes a move the cat generally jumps towards him 
soon afterwards." 



296 Erewhon Revisited 

"You give him a very high character." 

*'Yes, but I have my doubts about his doing much 
in this matter; he is getting old, and Hanky burrows 
Hke a mole night and day. There is no knowing how 
it will all end." 

"And the people at Sunch'ston? Has it got well 
about among them, in spite of your admirable article, 
that it was the Sunchild himself who interrupted 
Hanky?" 

"It has, and it has not. Many of us know the truth, 
but a story came down from Bridgeford that it was an 
evil spirit who had assumed the Sunchild's form, in- 
tending to make people sceptical about Sunchildism; 
Hanky and Panky cowed this spirit, otherwise it would 
never have recanted. Many people swallow this." 

"But Hanky and Panky swore that they knew the 
man." 

"That does not matter." 

"And now, please, how long have you been mar- 
ried?" 

"About ten months." 

"Any family?" 

"One boy about a fortnight old. Do come down to 
Sunch'ston and see him — he is your own nephew. 
You speak Erewhonian so perfectly that no human 
being would suspect you were a foreigner, and you 
look one of us from head to foot. I can smuggle you 
through quite easily, and my mother would so like to 
see you." 

I should dearly have liked to have gone, but it was 
out of the question. I had nothing with me but the 
clothes I stood in ; moreover I was longing to be back 
in England, and when once I was in Erewhon there 



Conclusion 297 

was no knowing when I should be able to get away 
again ; but George fought hard before he gave in. 

It was now nearing the time when this strange meet- 
ing between two brothers — as strange a one as the 
statues can ever have looked down upon — must come 
to an end. I shewed George what the repeater would 
do, and what it would expect of its possessor. I gave 
him six good photographs, of my father and myself — 
three of each. He had never seen a photograph, and 
could hardly believe his eyes as he looked at those I 
shewed him. I also gave him three envelopes ad- 
dressed to myself, care of Alfred Emery Cathie, Esq., 
15 CHfford's Inn, London, and implored him to write 
to me if he could ever find means of getting a letter 
over the range as far as the shepherd's hut. At this he 
shook his head, but he promised to write if he could. 
I also told him that I had Vv^ritten a full account of my 
father's second visit to Erewhon, but that it should 
never be published till I heard from him — at which 
he again shook his head, but added, ''And yet who can 
tell? For the King may have the country opened up 
to foreigners some day after all." 

Then he thanked me a thousand times over, shoul- 
dered the knapsack, embraced me as he had my father, 
and caressed the dog, embraced me again, and made 
no attempt to hide the tears that ran down his cheeks. 

"There," he said ; "I shall wait here till you are out 
of sight." 

I turned away, and did not look back till I reached 
the place at which I knew that I should lose the statues. 
I then turned round, waved my hand — as also did 
George, and went down the mountain side, full of sad 
thoughts, but thankful that my task had been so hap- 



298 Erewhon Revisited 

pily accomplished, and aware that my Hfe hencefor- 
ward had been enriched by something that I could 
never lose. 

For I had never seen, and felt as though I never 
could see, George's equal. His absolute unconscious- 
ness of self, the unhesitating way in which he took me 
to his heart, his fearless frankness, the happy genial 
expression that played on his face, and the extreme 
sweetness of his smile — these were the things that 
made me say to myself that the ''blazon of beauty*s 
best" could tell me nothing better than what I had 
found and lost within the last three hours. How 
small, too, I felt by comparison! If for no other 
cause, yet for this, that I, who had wept so bitterly 
over my own disappointment the day before, could 
meet this dear fellow's tears with no tear of my own. 

But let this pass. I got back to Harris's hut without 
adventure. When there, in the course of the evening, 
I told Harris that I had a fancy for the rug he had 
found on the river-bed, and that if he would let me 
have it, I would give him my red one and ten shillings 
to boot. The exchange was so obviously to his ad- 
vantage that he made no demur, and next morning I 
strapped Yram's rug on to my horse, and took it 
gladly home to England, where I keep it on my own 
bed next to the counterpane, so that with care it may 
last me out my life. I wanted him to take the dog and 
make a home for him, but he had two collies already, 
and said that a retriever would be of no use to him. 
So I took the poor beast on with me to the port, where 
I was glad to find that Mr. Baker liked him and ac- 
cepted him from me, though he was not mine to give. 
He had been such an unspeakable comfort to me when 



Postscript 299 

I was alone, that he would have haunted me unless I 
had been able to provide for him where I knew he 
would be well cared for. As for Doctor, I was sorry 
to leave him, but I knew he was in good hands. 

*'I see you have not brought your knapsack back, 
sir,'' said Mr. Baker. 

*'No," said I, "and very thankful was I when I had 
handed it over to those for whom it was intended." 

*'I have no doubt you were, sir, for I could see it 
was a desperate heavy load for you." 

^'Indeed it was." But at this point I brought the 
discussion to a close. 

Two days later I sailed, and reached home early in' 
February 1892. I was married three weeks later, and 
when the honeymoon was over, set about making the 
necessary, and some, I fear, unnecessary additions to 
this book — by far the greater part of which had been 
written, as I have already said, many months earlier. 
I now leave it, at any rate for the present, April 22, 
1892. 



Postscript. — On the last day of November 1900, I 
received a letter addressed in Mr. Alfred Cathie's fa- 
miliar handwriting, and on opening it found that it 
contained another, addressed to me in my own, and 
unstamped. For the moment I was puzzled, but im- 
mediately knew that it must be from George. I tore 
it open, and found eight closely written pages, which 
I devoured as I have seldom indeed devoured so long 
a letter. It was dated XXIX. vii. i, and, as nearly as 
I can translate it, was as follows : — 

'Twice, my dearest brother, have I written to you, 
and twice in successive days in successive years, have 



300 Erewhon Revisited 

I been up to the statues on the chance that you could 
meet me, as I proposed in my letters. Do not think 
I went all the way back to Sunch'ston — there is a 
ranger's shelter now only an hour and a half below 
the statues, and here I passed the night. I knew you 
had got neither of my letters, for if you had got them 
and could not come yourself, you would have sent some 
one whom you could trust with a letter. I know you 
would, though I do not know how you would have 
contrived to do it. 

"I sent both letters through Bishop Kahabuka (or, 
as his inferior clergy call him, 'Chowbok'), head of 
the Christian Mission to Erewhemos, which, as your 
father has doubtless told you, is the country ad- 
joining Erewhon, but inhabited by a coloured race 
having no affinity with our own. Bishop Kahabuka 
has penetrated at times into Erewhon, and the King, 
wishing to be on good terms with his neighbours, has 
permitted him to establish two or three mission 
stations in the western part of Erewhon. Among the 
missionaries are some few of your own countrymen. 
None of us like them, but one of them is teaching me 
English, which I find quite easy. 

"As I wrote in the letters that have never reached 
you, I am no longer Ranger. The King, after some 
few years (in the course of which I told him of your 
visit, and what you had brought me), declared that 
I was the only one of his servants whom he could 
trust, and found high office for me, which kept me in 
close confidential communication with himself. 

"About three years ago, on the death of his Prime 
Minister, he appointed me to fill his place ; and it was 



Postscript 301 

on this, that so many possibilities occurred to me con- 
cerning which I dearly longed for your opinion, that 
I wrote and asked you, if you could, to meet me per- 
sonally or by proxy at the statues, which I could reach 
on the occasion of my annual visit to my mother — yes 
— and father — at Sunch'ston. 

"I sent both letters by way of Erewhemos, con- 
fiding them to Bishop Kahabuka, who is just such an- 
other as St. Hanky. He tells me that our father was 
a very old and dear friend of his — but of course I did 
not say anything about his being my own father. I 
only inquired about a Mr. Higgs, who was now wor- 
shipped in Erewhon as a supernatural being. The 
Bishop said it was, "Oh, so very dreadful," and he 
felt it all the more keenly, for the reason that he had 
himself been the means of my father's going to Ere- 
whon, by giving him the information that enabled him 
to find the pass over the range that bounded the coun- 
try. 

"I did not like the man, but I thought I could trust 
him with a letter, which it now seems I could not do. 
This third letter I have given him with a promise of 
a hundred pounds in silver for his new Cathedral, to 
be paid as soon as I get an answer from you. 

''We are all well at Sunch'ston; so are my wife and 
eight children — ^five sons and three daughters — but the 
country is at sixes and sevens. St. Panky is dead, but 
his son Pocus is worse. Dr. Downie has become very 
lethargic. I can do less against St. Hankyism than 
when I was a private man. A little indiscretion on my 
part would plunge the country in civil war. Our en- 
gineers and so-called men of science are sturdily beg- 



302 Erewhon Revisited 

ging for endowments, and steadily claiming to have a 
hand in every pie that is baked from one end of the 
country to the other. The missionaries are buying up 
all our silver, and a change in the relative values of 
gold and silver is in progress of which none of us 
foresee the end. 

'The King and I both think that annexation by 
England, or a British Protectorate, would be the 
saving of us, for we have no army worth the name, 
and if you do not take us over some one else soon will. 
The King has urged me to send for you. If you come 
(do! do! do!) you had better come by way of Ere- 
whemos, which is now in monthly communication 
with Southampton. If you will write me that you are 
coming I will meet you at the port, and bring you with 
me to our own capital, where the King will be over- 
joyed to see you." 

The rest of the letter was filled with all sorts of 
news which interested me, but would require chapters 
of explanation before they could become interesting 
to the reader. 

The letter wound up : — 

^'You may publish now whatever you like, whenever 
you like. 

"Write to me by way of Erewhemos, care of the 
Right Reverend the Lord Bishop, and say which way 
you will come. If you prefer the old road, we are 
bound to be in the neighbourhood of the statues by the 
beginning of March. My next brother is now Ranger, 
and could meet you at the statues with permit and 
luncheon, and more of that white wine than ever you 



Postscript 303 

will be able to drink. Only let me know what you 
will do. 

"I should tell you that the old railway which used 
to run from Clearwater to the capital, and which, as 
you know, was allowed to go to ruin, has been recon- 
structed at an outlay far less than might have been 
expected — for the bridges had been maintained for 
ordinary carriage traffic. The journey, therefore, 
from Sunch'ston to the capital can now be done in 
less than forty hours. On the whole, however, I rec- 
ommend you to come by way of Erewhemos. If you 
start, as I think possible, without writing from Eng- 
land, Bishop Kahabuka's palace is only eight miles 
from the port, and he will give you every information 
about your further journey — a distance of less than a 
couple of hundred miles. But I should prefer to meet 
you myself. 

*'My dearest brother, I charge you by the memory 
of our common father, and even more by that of those 
three hours that linked you to me for ever, and which 
I would fain hope linked me also to yourself — come 
over, if by any means you can do so — come over and 
help us. 

* 'George Strong." 

"My dear,*' said I to my wife who was at the other 
end of the breakfast table, "I shall have to translate 
this letter to you, and then you will have to help me 
to begin packing; for I have none too much time. I 
must see Alfred, and give him a power of attorney. 
He will arrange with some publisher about my book, 
and you can correct the press. Break the news gently 



304 Erewhon Revisited 

to the children; and get along without me, my dear, 
for six months as well as you can." 

I write this at Southampton, from which port I sail 
to-morrow — i.e. November 15, 1900 — for Erewhemos. 



THE END. 



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